SAO: The Spirit Blades
by Irelia Yuuki
Summary: [AU] [T-Rated for now, may go up to M] Maho is a successful daughter of the Yuuki family and older sister to Asuna Yuuki. Shino is a friend of Maho's and Kazuto's. But what Kazuto didn't know was that Maho was a Alpha tester of SAO and Shino got a beta key from said girl. How will things in the death game turn out with some extra Unique Skills and three extra friends for Kazuto?
1. The First Day

**A/N: Hello and welcome to my 2nd story. This is a SAO AU fanfic where Asuna has a big, LoL playing sister and Sinon is also a beta-tester of SAO. Constructive criticism is appreciated as well as feedback. Anyways, if there are any typos and grammar errors please contact me and I shall correct them. Note: I don't intend to make this story a SAO/LoL crossover fanfic as there will be only tiny bits of LoL mentioned and you do not need to know the game to understand this story.**

 **Also, a HUGE shoutout to** **Gashadokuro Amanojaku for pointing out the plot holes in this first chapter. It is also he who beta-read the reworked chapter. Thank you! :)**

 **Enjoy!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own SAO/LoL and do not claim ownership to its characters/story/general stuff**

It was a warm day in the month of May and Asada Shino was sitting in the cafeteria of the Kokusai high school as she saw the new girl come into the cafeteria. She had beautiful, large green eyes that complimented her crimson lips and straight, sorta small nose well. Her waist-long, smooth onyx-colored hair stood a nice contrast to her pure alabaster skin. She was surrounded by so many boys that you could only barely make out the tiny spotlets of black that consisted of her black sweater. A bone-piercing cold cry broke the regular chatter of the cafeteria.

"WOULD you PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE?!"

With that, most of the boys' shoulders just slumped forward and they walked away. Then, the mysterious girl sat down across of Shino.

"Hey Shino. Long time no see. Still remember me?"

After Shino had caught up with the girl actually sitting down with her, she recognized the person. It was Maho Yuuki. The 2nd child of the Yuuki family. A genius in her own right, she graduated from MIT (with a PhD in both IT and physics) just a few days ago, at the age of 15, having done elementary school at 6 and graduating secondary school at the tender age of 12. But why was she here now? She was also a very skilled gamer, as she is ranked in multiple international online gaming leaderboards of different genres, ranging from FPS to RTS games. Furthermore, she had 2 accounts in the game "League Of Legends" ranked in challenger, this being a smaller but relevant achievement in games. (The larger ones being some international gaming tournaments she had won)

"Maho? Why are you here?" "Well, I graduated from MIT Massachusetts a few days ago… And as I know your story, I'm here to back you up. The principal has agreed under the condition that my tests and results are not calculated into the school's average score and that I do not contribute anything to the classes. Also, I _know_ that you are being bullied. So, why not, as strings are fairly easy to pull if you are in my position…"

' _Though he simply agreed when I said that I wanted a bit of a social life now that I am back in japan,_ ' the girl thought, not mentioning this to Shino.

At that comment, Shino thought, understanding, ' _so that's why she is here now…_ '

"Maho, are you serious about this? I mean I don't want to tarnish your reputation. Also, _I know_ that your mom wouldn't appreciate you being here." "I am sure, of course. Mom is another issue. She knows your story but, as a long-time friend of your mother's, she let me go. By the way, have you met the new dude, what's his name again? Kazuto?"

Deciding to just drop the matter on how Maho was here, Shino simply went along with it, understanding that her childhood friend just wanted to help.

"Yea, he's an ok guy but seems like he's the second person to get me real mad…" To that, Maho just put on a mischievous smirk. "Seems like I'm not alone then. Oh, yeah, by the way, I have a gift for you. Because I am a top challenger with 2 accounts, I got you a beta to the game 'Sword Art Online'. I will participate beginning with the alpha because I was randomly chosen as 1 of 250 alpha testers. So I'll see you in the beta."

Shino just thought ' _oh great, a game…_ ' but simply accepted the gift. "Thanks."

The next few weeks went uneventful for both Shino and Maho. Shino befriended Kazuto and, well, he was also popular. Due to this, Maho and Kazuto became fast friends with her and the 3 teens hang out together when they could.

This attracted the attention and envy of Endou, though, who decided to just bully Shino to the ground as she also knew the black-haired girl's secret. One day, she just grabbed Shino's arm and dragged her into an alleyway.

"So, Shino, what are you doing with Maho-chan and Kazuto-kun?" She asked. "Make sure that you stay away from them both, you're a filthy killer that doesn't deserve them." "Endou, I am not doing anything to them, apart from being the-"Her sentence ended as she saw Endou form a pistol with her hand. "Boom."

With that, Shino broke down with a scream, her memories hitting back at her, the very memories she tried to forget every day. Tears started falling as the stench of sulfur and blood came at her full force. Eventually, Shino got torn out of her memories by a cold, ice cold voice.

"Endou, what are you doing?" Endou just turned to the entrance of the alleyway and covered Shino with her silhouette. "Nothing?" she replied, getting a little nervous.

"Endou, why not let Shino step out of the shadows and tell the truth. Haven't you had enough bullying her for a few years already?" At this, Endou paled, knowing that Maho had more than enough ways to stomp both her social and private life into the ground.

"What are you talking about? I am not doing anything. Am I, Shino-chan?" She sounded, desperate to get herself out of this situation.

"Bullshit. I know for a fact that you are bullying Shino with her past, because I know her story and saw you acting toxic towards her all the time. Now get lost before I choose to publish the stories I dug up from your past. Because if i would do that, oh boy... those dudes would have a new victim." At that, Shino decided to look up, seeing that it was Maho who arrived at the scene.

With that, Endou snapped. "JUST GET AWAY! WHAT DO I HAVE TO DO TO BE POPULAR?!" she then just ran away.

"Shino, are you okay?" Maho's voice sounded, suddenly back to the caring tone of voice she usually had. Shino just froze, not knowing what to do as another figure popped up, clad in black clothes, unlike Maho, who wore a long yellow summer dress. "Maho, what's going on here?" he asked.

Shino recognized the voice as Kazuto's as Maho spoke up yet again. "Endou was bullying Shino around, using her past to destroy her." With that, Shino decided to stand up. Thanking them for the save, and telling them that she just wanted to go home. Hearing that, the two walked her home.

The time for the closed alpha stage of SAO had finally come. Being the gamer that she was, Maho went into the alpha stage the first minute the server opened up. Being the first to be able to create her character was a nice perk, as all the names would be free.

She chose her name after the favorite champ of hers in League (in other words: the champ that she carried her way to challenger with), meaning that **Irelia** was her name from now on.

The appearance of the character was vastly different though. Instead of the red armored clothing and the gigantic blade the champion possessed, the avatar had a white starter shirt and a **Small Sword** equipped. Being female, the avatar also had a matching skirt that reached down to the knees with jet-black stockings, with fittingly black shoes adorning her feet as she stood there. The face was a perfect copy of Maho's, with a few years in difference, apart from the baby-blue eyes and blonde hair. Frowning at the sight, she just changed the avatar's eyes into a clear, shining emerald color and the previously hair to strands of flowing onyx, matching her 'real' appearance. Then, she changed the starter shirt's color into a dark blue and chose the **hooded** option. This option equipped the character with a hooded cape with infinite durability and no stat boosts, thus being purely cosmetic. (The attacks would just tear through the cloth with full strength, ripping it apart. The hood would regenerate when the player is not in combat, much like a passive mending characteristic. This mechanic was also used for other cosmetic clothing items.) The coat itself though looked good. Making one final change at her skirt, she changed its color into a darker blue than the shirt, noticing a white trim at the bottom of the skirt. With that, the character creation was complete.

Spawning in the **Starting City** , she gained her bearings. ' _Wow, such a large city. And this on floor 1. I wonder what the other towns look like. Also, such great detail that went into this. According to the manual, there must be 99 more cities like this…_ " After that first look around, Irelia tried to walk… which ended with her falling face first to the floor. ' _I've got to work on the walking…_ ' She thought as she tried heaving herself off the floor. ' _… and on my arm movements, too…_ '

The rest of the 2 month long alpha test went by as uneventful as it possibly could have been. The few bugs that were there have been fixed and it was a nice experience all along, as there were no game-breaking bugs. (The few minor bugs found were almost always fixed the day afterwards, being live-logged and fixed in the nightly server reset.) Irelia was now at level 23, whilst reaching floor 11, which resulted in her being recognized as the strongest player in the alpha.

In the last week of the alpha, Kayaba Akihiko announced a knock-out type tournament where everybody could participate in, the prize being a Unique Skill and a weapon to go with it, and a privilege to keep one item, apart from the prize, 10% of the XP (all of the proficiencies will be reset on release), and 5% of the currently owned col in the beta and the release.

Everybody was allowed to sign up. But many were actually discouraged by the top-25 players already signed up, thus resulting in roughly 75 entries from the testers.

The tournament was to be held in an arena especially made for 3 dimensional combat, not limiting the players vertically, giving their skills a fair chance, thus allowing the weak people to be able to outplay the stronger ones.

What Kayaba didn't know though, is that Maho gathered a lot of experience of 3-D movement since she was (almost) always messing with acrobatics in-game. To state a fact, it is also because she has a very advanced spatial awareness that enabled her to pull this off. Also, her fair share of gaming experience helped her a lot in the end, as the raw skill of hers proved to be pretty much unmatched in the alpha, bringing her into the finals with relative ease.

So, the player that she met in the finals was a gamer who called himself **Pale Rider**. He had boosted all his stats into AGI and used a speed boosting dagger, resulting in a fairly even fight. That amount of speed combined with skill proved enough to be able to skillfully dodge and weave in the 3-D movement map and, eventually, get to Irelia. But due to the lack of damage the dagger had, Irelia almost always out-traded Pale Rider and simply finished him, choosing to take the hits and go for the tournament-winning kill.

With that, she had gained the Unique Skill called **Spirit Blades: Hiten** and a weapon called **Chronokeeper**. It was a four-bladed floating weapon with a small golden sphere in the center. The blades themselves were all similar; a straight, handle-less sword with a single edge forged out of golden colored metal. The transparent fuller consisted of metallic colored gears of various size, most only partially displayed. Also, the cross guard is a quarter of a circle with two spikes protruding outwards and one spike over the fuller.

' _This is simply ironic. I chose the name of my favorite champion and now I get the matching weapon._ ' Irelia thought, ' _Even the name of the fighting style is the same._ '

Upon further examining the weapon, she found out that it was able to equip a light weapon whilst commanding the blade (and one was able to use both the equipped weapon's and the Chronokeeper's Sword Skills at the same time), as it was autonomously floating around and awaiting the command of the mind.

Also, the weapon has a passive called **Variability** ; a unique passive to this sword that gives it varying other passives depending on what sword skills one used. Also, this gives the **Chronokeeper** damage scaling to the level of mastery and the player's XP, making the **Chronokeeper** one of the strongest weapons of the game.

But, as we all know, strength comes at a price. The largest drawback is called **Spirit Bonds** ; it lowered the defensive values of the user once the sword, or parts of it, are farther than 1.5m away from the user (the distance will scale with the mastery level, eventually ending at 2.5 meters). Once that happened, the defensive stats got a huge hit down, which would then decline farther the farther the blade was. On maximum range (15m) even a boar on the first floor could one hit kill you. This was made so that abusing the **Chronokeeper** 's range couldn't be done unless one wanted to get punished really hard for it.

The last passive though is what makes the weapon special. It's called **Adaptability** ; one could copy a sword skill of choice at mastery level 500 and 1000, but only if it was a skill for a one-handed sharp weapon (one handed axe, rapier, sword, dagger and similar). If the copied skill is executed, the blades will follow the path of the blade and effectively skyrocket the hit amount by 5 times. The skills themselves had also got a much higher cooldown and freeze period though, while the actual sword skills of the **Chronokeeper** are freeze-less, being autonomous, though the cooldowns of the skills were at least a tenfold of the normal ones.

Seeing this, Irelia decided to also equip her **Sabre Ciel** , a sky-blue rapier and try fighting.

At first, she needed to accustom herself to the presence of the blades and activating sword skills. After a long day of fighting though she learned to use the blades to strike, without skill (which did almost no damage at all, unless you really planned out a strike), whilst striking out with her rapier.

In the end, she sold everything apart from the **Mimung** , a rapier acquired as a last-hit bonus from the 10th floor boss. This rapier wasn't upgraded so the **Sabre Ciel** was effectively stronger than the newer rapier's base stats. In the end, she got a message that she would get a XP bonus for 2 weeks, a special coat for alpha testers of which you could customize the color and an extra non-combat skill slot, along with every other alpha-tester of the game.

Two weeks after the alpha ended, the closed beta began. Asada Shino created herself a character named **Sinon** and got to play the game, thanks to her best friend, Maho.

That girl wasn't able to participate in the beta, though, as she got a few sudden problems with her certificate of graduation, resulting in her getting back to the US for 4 weeks (with 2 of them being purely vacation).

The character itself resembled Shino's real face, with a few sharper contours and a pointier jawline, the main difference being the ice-blue eyes and turquoise hair.

Sinon then met Kazuto in the game, not knowing that it was him, as he was in the character of **Kirito**. The two became good friends, like in real life, and eventually came out as the two best players in the game; Sinon infamous for ranged attack accuracy and Kirito for one of the fastest reaction times in the whole beta.

The players in the beta got a few perks, such as a XP bonus for 1 week, a special cloak given to beta testers, allowing them to customize the color of said cloak without remaking it (the stat boosts were still nonexistent), and an extra non-combat skill slot (those could be acquired on release with an Easter-egg, and don't stack, meaning that you didn't get two skills extra, participating in the alpha and beta.). Extra starting col was also included, being 2.5% of their current col.

Knowing this, they both sold every item in their inventories on the last day of beta and decided to go to a café as their last act in the game.

The pair had a nice conversation until Kirito asked a somewhat weird question. "Sinon, you _are_ a girl, right?" "Of course I am. What did you expect?" Came her prompt answer, in a fairly angry tone. "Well, I have this friend in real life… and I wanted to spend time with them, but the beta got in the way and I got addicted to this… what should I do?" This caught Sinon by surprise, as she also had a friend with whom she spent a lot less time with since the beta. "To be true, I also have the same problem on my hands. If I were you, I'd just go and talk to them. That's the best solution." "Thanks!"

With that reply, the conversation went back to normal and they eventually logged off, after promising each other to meet in the release as well.

~2 days after the beta

Shino was sitting in the school cafeteria and thought about the SAO beta and her partner in-crime, Kirito, as she noticed two familiar faces walking towards her.

Putting on an apologetic smile, she said, at the same time as Kazuto: "Sorry."

Kazuto then frowned, asking her what was wrong. "Oh, I'm just apologizing for my business in the last month…" then, Kazuto simply smiled.

"I did also have a lot less time the last month, wanting to climb in League and betaing a game at the same time isn't easy, though… well, whatever. Maho, you up for a game of duo-queue tonight?"

Kazuto smiled even more as Maho nodded her affirmative and bade them farewell. She had class after all. This meant for Kazuto that his promotion series into master would go successful to say the least.

~A few days later:

Maho and Kazuto were sitting on a bench, rambling on about games after Shino left, giving them a bit of time together whilst she was preoccupied with class. (The two decided to keep shut about their gaming passion when Shino was present, as she found such things rather boring.)

"So, Kazuto, how do you find the VRMMO tech?" The older student asked, causing a surprised look to form on Kazuto's face.

"Well, I guess it's decent, not that bad, though I am not interested. Why?" He replied, not wanting to say something wrong, as Maho did mostly play old-school games.

Maho actually frowned as she really wanted to tell Kazuto that she had another NerVGear at home, which was not in use, and that Shino and her were going to play SAO.

Hearing him not interested threw her off a bit, leading to her not saying anything about that again. "Nothing. It popped up not so long ago and I wanted to know how you felt about it. That's all."

The next few months flew by like nothing and November the first soon came. The friends all met up in the morning as SAO would launch at 1 PM.

Sinon and Kazuto still don't know about each-other's characters in the beta. Although Shino knew about Maho playing SAO, she didn't ask about her in-game name as she had a partner already. (Also, one had to take her shyness into account, resulting in her not telling Kazuto that she was beta-testing SAO.)

One could also say that Kazuto felt indifferent about it, not knowing that the two girls played SAO, and not thinking about Maho being interested in VRMMO tech.

Eventually they disbanded to get online into SAO, as it was about lunchtime and the launch of the game would come soon.

~Maho's POV (1st person)

I heard my sister asking me if I would allow her to use onii-chan's NerVGear that he bought last week. Not thinking that there would be any complications, I agreed. After giving her my approval, she went ahead and got herself linked up. "I'm going to play SAO for a while, be back at 5." "OK" came her reply.

Looking at the clock, I saw that it was already 12:55. Connecting my NerVGear to the computer and inserting my copy of SAO, I laid down on my bed and waited for the hour to pass, knowing that I'd have to find Shino.

As the clock hit 1 pm, I shouted: "Link Start!" After that, I was asked whether I chose the **Advanced Login** (start with the little bonuses from the alpha) or the **Normal Login** (start anew like any other player). Choosing the **Advanced Login** option, I was asked if I wanted to change the appearance of my avatar, whose face was essentially my face plus a few years.

Finding these settings alright, I just entered the game, along with everybody else, as I took on my in-game name. Whilst running around town, I was opening my gifts from the alpha test stage and checking buffs and nerfs to the items I had;

The **Mimung** 's AGI and DMG were nerfed a bit, also its residual effects have partially been removed, and the DEF reduction for the **Chronokeeper** has been slightly increased.

Now I doubt that the beautiful Rapier will be the Last-Hit Bonus for the 10th floor boss, but rather a quest reward or a rare monster drop, as the residual effects were what made the blade so special, and I needed to be even more careful when using a little larger range.

As I was level 6 (kept some of my XP from the alpha stage) I had 4 skill slots, of which 3 were spent; **Spirit Blades: Hiten** , **One-Handed Rapier** and **Acrobatics**.The 4th skill slot was a non-combat skill, so I chose **Sprint** , as I didn't need nor use that before.

Then, I hid my level and general stats using the privacy options in the game, hoping not to attract the attention of any noobies in the game.

After a while, I saw a red-headed guy talking to a way too handsome man in his late 20's in an alleyway. Deciding to remember their names as the word "Beta-tester" fell, I read their names; **Kirito** and **Klein**.

Making a mental note, I wrapped around a corner just to see the town gates appear. I exited the town gate whilst thinking what Shino would do in the game.

~Shino's & Kazuto's POV (3rd person)

Shino logged into the game with a happy look on her face as she reentered the world of SAO. Then, the one thing on her mind was to find her partner, Kirito. Knowing that she had a slightly increased amount of starting col from the beta, she made for the shops, even finding some rare steel throwing knives, which tore up a lot of her budget.

After equipping herself with an ornate looking, black bladed dagger called **Ebony Wing** , (that alone cost her half of her col, as it was one of these one-time only offers that randomly popped up. These were mostly expensive, but worth it, having great upgrade potential and decent base stats), and some light armor, she was fine heading to the fields, investing her skill points in **One-Handed Dagger** , **Blade Throwing** and **Searching** for the non-combat skill slot.

Knowing that she still had stat points to spend, she spent two points in AGI and one in STR, as the dagger was AGI based and you needed STR to effectively use **Blade Throwing**. After that, she headed out into the fields, her intuition telling her that she would find Kirito in the fields.

Meanwhile Kirito has logged into SAO. Clutching his fist and grinning to himself, he made out for the shops whilst taking two points in STR and one point in AGI.

Being level 1, he chose the **One-Handed Sword** and the **Battle Healing** Skills, also having **Searching** for his non-combat skill slot. Looking at his **Small Sword** , he frowned. He had to get the **Anneal Blade** quite soon if he was to get any one-handed long swords at this stage.

Running to the gates of the **Starting City** , he stopped as he heard someone calling. "Hey! Wait up!"

After turning around, he saw a red-headed man talking to him. "What's up?" Kirito asked. "You're from the beta, right? I see it in the way you move. Could you teach a newb the ropes? Oh yeah, names Klein by the way"

Considering his options, Kirito thought that training Klein didn't come with any direct disadvantages, he accepted. "Ok. So what type of player do you want to become? My name's Kirito, by the way. Nice to meet you." "I want to become a super tanky samurai!" Came his reply, which made Kirito chuckle. "Well, let's hurry and get supplies. I don't want to keep my partner waiting." With that, the two people made their way to the fields after visiting the shops.

(On the fields)

"Owwwww! That hurts!" Klein grunted, clutching his crotch after a boar hit him in said part of the body. "It doesn't really hurt, though…" Kirito said. "Oh, force of habit."

Kirito then told Klein that the secret in using sword skills was in the starting motion, picking up a pebble and throwing it. Klein tried to get a sword skill activated as Kirito pointed out that he should try waiting for the skill to build up and, eventually let it go. Klein did just that and unleashed a **Reaver** sword skill, killing the boar that Kirito brought to half-life.

"Wow, I knew that you were here, Kirito-kun" came a calm voice, causing the boy to turn around. "Sinon! How have you been?" To Klein he said: "Klein, this is Sinon, my partner from the beta test. She-"

"Hello! My name's Klein. I'm 24, single and-"

His sentence was interrupted by Kirito, who hit Klein in the crotch. Sinon, obviously annoyed, thanked Kirito for his quick reaction. After that, they went grinding and grinding. And after that, even more grinding.

(The same day 5:25 PM, fields outside the starting city)

The three people were up on a hillside, enjoying the view. As Klein suddenly brought up the subject of logging off because he had a pizza which was to arrive in 5 minutes. Swiping in the air for his menu to pop up, he frowned as he didn't see the logout button he was searching for.

"Err… Kirito, there's no logout button…" "What? It's right th-" Kirito stopped talking as he too swiped up his menu and saw that the logout button was missing indeed. "What the…" Sinon muttered.

Kirito was the first to regain his composure. "Maybe it's a bug. I guess that it'll be fixed soon… but such a bug? On release? It didn't happen in the beta, though… and the GM's aren't responding"

After that, a bell rang, echoing through the whole floor and a blue light engulfed each of the three players. As the light subsided, they found themselves in the central plaza.

Whilst briefly wondering what was going on, Kirito spoke up. "A forced teleport?" Noticing that probably every other player logged into SAO was here too, thoughts started swimming in his head, which were then interrupted by Sinon, who was pointing at a hexagon in the sky. "There! A System announcement notice!"

The hexagons quickly spread, covering the entire sky of the floor. Then, a red liquid poured out of the borders of the hexagons, forming a sphere, and eventually a hooded man.

" **Welcome, players of Sword Art Online, to my world. My Name is Kayaba Akihiko and I am the GM of this VRMMORPG. As many if not all of you have already noticed, there is no logout button. This is NOT a bug. I repeat. This is NOT a bug. This is how it is supposed to be.** "

' _Oh Shit_ ' Kirito thought as Kayaba continued.

" **You cannot log yourselves out of the game. Nobody from the outside will be able to shut down or remove the NerVGear on your head. Should they still try to do so, the NerVGear will discharge an overly strong microwave signal to destroy your brain, thus ending your life. Despite me distributing a warning before this announcement, 213 careless families or friends have tried to remove the helmet and now must pay the price.** "

"What?!" Klein shouted, "That many? Impossible!"

" **Seeing this, all of you can rest assured that your experience in Aincrad will be undisturbed. Also, if your HP drops to zero, your avatar will be erased from the system and, simultaneously, the NerVGear will destroy your brain.** "

Kirito froze. ' _This is absolutely insane! If you die in-game, your real body dies as well._ '

" **There is only one way you can escape now. At the moment, you're at floor 1 of the castle Aincrad. Beat all the 100 floors and the final boss and all players shall be free to return to the outer world.** "

With that, Kazuto snapped back to reality. ' _Resources and XP are limited, items will get rarer the farther we go. There is only one way to survive. Be fast, get strong, and beat the game._ ' Shino seemed to have calmed down from the initial shock too. In her mind, it was pretty much the same thing. But she was also wondering about Maho's whereabouts.

" **This marks the end of the tutorial of Sword Art Online. To commemorate that, I have sent you all a gift. Please examine your inboxes.** "

The three opened their inboxes, along with everybody else, to find a **Hand Mirror** in each of their inboxes. Taking them out, blue light once again engulfed the people. This time, the entire plaza was affected as well. As the light subsided, they looked into the mirror.

Kirito had a much more effeminate face and his hair got slightly shorter and his eyes a little bit rounder. Now, he didn't look like **Kirito** anymore, but rather like Kazuto Kirigaya.

Sinon met the same fate, her eyes and hair returning to their normal dark grey/black coloring, the jawline becoming rounder and the face in general changing into a younger version of itself.

Klein wasn't even recognizable anymore, though. His hair got short and spiky, his jaw flat and bearded, and his face in general changed into the edgier direction.

After overcoming the shock that their avatar's current appearances resembled their real life counterparts, Kirito recognized Sinon as Shino, and likewise with Sinon recognizing Kirito as Kazuto. Then, Kayaba Akihiko decided to interrupt the little moment of shock the two friends were sharing.

" **As you all can see, I have changed your avatar's look to resemble the faces and bodies of your current selves. This Marks the creation of your new reality. I hope you enjoy the stay in my world.** "

With that, the man that trapped 10.000 people in a virtual reality disappeared. Kirito was the first to take action. Pulling Sinon and Klein out into a little alleyway, thus escaping the chaos that ensued immediately after that as a result.

"Guys, XP and Col are limited, so we've got to go. Now. The mobs on the nearby fields are gonna be wiped out in no-time. I know another town that is not very far from here. The route, although dangerous, is not difficult to manage. So I, or better, we as in Sinon and I, want you to come along, Klein." Came Kirito's quick explanation.

Klein frowned. He had a few friends that were back at the plaza that were waiting for him there. Knowing this, he declined the offer. "Thanks, Kirito, but I can't accept your offer. I've got a few friends that will need my help. I will teach them what you taught me, so they will survive this death game." "So this is goodbye then." Kirito concluded. "Yeah. But do me a favor. Don't die." "Will do!" These were the last words that Kirito spoke to Klein before he ran off in direction **Horunka**.

After a while, Kirito spoke up. "Shino?" "Yes, Kazuto?" "Why have you joined SAO? I thought you aren't into gaming" "Well, I got my NerVGear and beta key from Maho, who won it being at the top of the challenger division."

Then, a blush crept over Sinon's face out of nowhere. 'So he was consulting me about… me!' "So why did you consult me about… me? You knew that I couldn't be mad at you for something as trivial as that…" "I dunno, just felt like you could." Sinon chuckled.

"Oh yeah, how should I call you?" He asked. "How about Sinon in public and Shino if it's just us two? Oh. How about you by the way?" "Well, I think the same would work for me" he concluded, stopping the conversation there as the two friends made their way towards the village of **Horunka**.

~Maho's PoV (3rd person)

' _Well, I'll be damned._ ' she thought. ' _I've got to find Shino. And quickly so._ '

Putting herself in the younger girl's mindset, she knew that Shino would probably head to **Horunka** , a small village located in the northwest of the **Starting** **City**. Still mildly annoyed that her appearance has become like her real-life image, she made her way to the northwest, activating her **Sprinting** skill. But little does she know that more than one person close to her was trapped in Kayaba Akihiko's death game.

To be continued.

 **A/N: That was quite the prologue, wasn't it? Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. As always, Feedback and constructive criticism much appreciated and thanks for reading. Leave a PM if you find any typos/grammar errors.**

 **That's all. Yours truly,**

 **~Irelia Yuuki.**


	2. Friend or foe, who shall know

**A/N: Hello and welcome to the 2** **nd** **chapter of my fanfiction. In this chapter, plot is going to happen. Maho is going to meet with Kazuto and Shino. Asuna won't actually appear when they're grinding, as it happened in the light novels, but rather in the boss meeting, where she joins the party of Kirito & Co. This is a fully intentional point as Maho should be surprised and such, having her little sister in the game. **

**Anyways, if you found any typos and/or grammar errors, leave a PM. If you like the story, feel free to leave a review, I'd very much appreciate it.**

 **EDITED A/N: Changed Kirito's level to match the one of the canon timeline, Sinon's level has been changed too, as she was with Kirito all the time, resulting in her having the same level. Also, i accidentally added one too many skill slots on Kirito and Sinon.**

 **Also, a thank you to** **Gashadokuro Amanojaku for betaing this chapter, although he didn't find any major plot holes this time (apart from the ones now edited) ;)**

 **Enjoy! :)**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **For disclaimers: view first chapter disclaimers.**

~Unknown PoV

' _I shouldn't have given her that unique skill in the alpha. Being the gamer that she was, though, she went into the game anyways. Well, that will work out._ ' A person clad in a lab coat and dress pants was thinking to himself. ' _Now I just need to find the other worthy ones._ '

'… _Implementing archery as an extra skill was actually a risky idea. But as there are no assists whatsoever, I think that it won't be easy to get and even more difficult to use. This skill is in my opinion extremely rewarding but also punishing, should one neglect the low damage. I just hope that there will be someone to acquire the skill.'_

~Maho's PoV (1st person) (November 1st, 2022)

I activated my **Sprinting** Skill that I've just recently acquired and made my way to Horunka, equipping my cosmetic cape I acquired in the character creation page. I know that there are no specific hunger or exhaustion related debuffs, so the only mentionable thing would be mental fatigue, which a nap will fix.

Right now, though, I needed to overtake Shino to get to **Horunka** , slaughtering away the monsters whilst doing so. Also, I wanted to make it a safer trip for her whilst keeping my **Unique Skill** a secret.

After a while of sprinting, I saw two black-haired people walking along the road, the male slightly taller than the female character. Assuming that this was Shino and somebody else, I just sprinted past them.

' _Now the fun begins'_ I thought, whilst unsheathing my **Mimung** and the **Chronokeeper** , and started slaughtering everything. The wolves didn't even stand a chance as the **Mimung** 's damage output was so high that even a light hit could kill them from full HP, and the **Chronokeeper** spinning closely around me prevented any wolves to get too close..

With that in mind, I reached **Horunka** in no time. ' _They better go to the shop_ ' I thought, as I left a note saying:

" _ **Hello, Shino. Meet me tomorrow morning at 9 AM in front of the two-story house. See you there. Maho**_ "

With that, I got myself an inn room and went to sleep, as sprinting and fighting all day did take its toll on me.

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV (3rd person); Time skip: -5 hours

The two teenagers were on their way to **Horunka** as they saw a dark-blue clad figure sprint past them. Kirito and Sinon were shocked to say the least, as they thought that these speeds at this level was impossible. "Somebody must've invested all three stat points into AGI and have the **Sprinting** skill." Kirito mused.

Sinon simply nodded as she drifted around in her own thoughts, most of them being about Maho. ' _Where is she right now… I suppose that she will be meeting up with us soon._ '

Little did she know that the girl she was thinking about would be roaming in their destination when they arrived at **Horunka**.

~Time skip: 4.8 hours.

Sinon had separated from Kirito as she made her way to the shop district whilst Kazuto went to the inn, securing them a room. Her thoughts now were spinning mainly around the hooded person that they encountered. ' _She must've slaughtered all the mobs on the way. Just who is she?_ '

Opening the door that led to a shop, she stumbled on a little piece of paper stuck on the door. It read: " _ **Hello, Shino. Meet me tomorrow morning at 9 AM in front of the two-story house. See you there. Maho**_ " putting together all the pieces, she figured out that the person in the hood was actually Maho. This made her wonder how to break to Kirito that her long-time friend was probably screwed, as she used her skill slots and stat points wrongly, forgetting that Maho was an alpha tester of SAO.

~Kirito's PoV (1st person)

I was walking to the inn as I saw the hooded figure from before going up the stairs that led to the room. ' _How has she survived so far?_ ' I was asking myself as I got us a room to live in. After that, I made for the blacksmith for a sword-mending.

After the mending was completed, I messaged Shino that she should meet me at the two-story house in five minutes.

Said time later, my blue-haired friend came, confusion written in her pale-blue eyes (she changed her hair- and eye color back to how it was). "What's up?" I wondered, as Shino was indeed a bit off. "Well… I have a lead as to who we met on the road here… And I feel like you won't like it." Came her reply.

' _Well, what could I say? At least Maho isn't in this game with us…_ ' I thought as Shino continued by showing me a note, saying that she found it pinned on the door of the shop. It read: " _ **Hello, Shino. Meet me tomorrow morning at 9 AM in front of the two-story house. See you there. Maho**_ " with that, my thoughts were running as I puzzled the pieces together. Maho was the hooded person that ran in front of us all along!

While I was following that train of thought, though, Shino decided to pull me out of it. "Well, I'm tired and we need to meet Maho tomorrow morning. So we should get some sleep."

I quickly agreed, saying that I had a quest to accept before turning in and that she should go get a shower before sleeping. Shino complied, walking to the inn as I traded her a copy of my key. (I asked the innkeeper to give me two keys as we were two people.)

After doing so, I decided to get the quest for the **Anneal Blade** , the first real One-Handed Longsword, which was called 'secret medicine of the forest'. It tells me to get an ovule from a **Little Nepent** and bring it to the quest master, who was a mother in worry. Said mother's child was sick and the normal medicine doesn't help, so she needed to make the antidote with the ovule. Accepting the quest, I went back to the inn, hitting the bunks for the day.

The next day, Maho's PoV (3rd person)

Maho woke up with the sun shining in her eyes. She hadn't slept well, which made her forget for a moment that she had a meeting with Shino. Remembering this, she quickly got up and got ready for the day. After getting a shower, she made her way to the two-story house in Horunka, as she still wanted to take a nap for waking so early.

~Shino's and Kazuto's PoV (3rd person)

The two beta-testers were walking to the two-story house when they saw Maho already there, waiting for them whilst taking a nap. "Neh, Kazuto-kun. You've still got the quest to do haven't you?" Shino asked. "Well… yeah, I do indeed. This was the quest for the **Anneal Blade**. Let's get going, though. Maho is waiting… asleep."

~General PoV (3rd person)

Maho was not nearly as surprised as she should have been as Kazuto woke her up by poking her in the face. Instead, she chose to just move her head so Kazuto would miss. "Well who do we have here… if it isn't Shino… and Kazuto?! Now I am surprised." She stated. "Well, I was also surprised that our friend here has been playing SAO. Even more so as I was also her partner. Unknowingly so but still."

Kazuto's reply visibly surprised Maho, as she also didn't know about Kazuto playing SAO's beta test until then. Finally snapping out of it, she decided to take the quest for the **Anneal Blade**. "I'm gonna head into the house and get the quest. For a blade to sell and show while I am in the public." With that, she excused herself, leaving Shino and Kazuto to their thoughts.

After a while, Kazuto spoke up.: "So, Shino, how long did you know about Maho playing SAO?" Shino, deciding to not hide anything, came out with the truth. "Since the alpha stage started." Was her reply.

This visibly shocked Kazuto as he didn't know that somebody had even more experience than him in the game. Deciding just to let it pass, he told her his assumptions. "Do you think that she could be that **Unique Skill** user?"

"Who are you talking about?" Came a voice that disturbed their trains of thought. Kazuto turned around in surprise as he didn't notice Maho approaching, and the same goes for Shino.

Kazuto, deciding to be honest, answered. "Neh, Maho. Could you be that player that beat fifty or so of the other alpha testers?" This shocked Maho to the very core. But being the person that she was, and knowing Kazuto, she had nothing to fear from this. "Yes I am, indeed. But I think I should hide my skills for now. How did you figure it out?"

This question caught Kazuto off guard, as he didn't expect such an obvious question coming from Maho's mouth. Just shrugging over that, he decided to break it to her. "Well, it's pretty obvious, isn't it? You sprinted past us, meaning that you have invested something in the **Sprinting** skill. Also, you got here unscathed, as far as I can see. Another indicator that you're strong. And thirdly, you've slaughtered everything in your path to get here. It doesn't need much of a detective to figure it out then."

After that, Maho understood. Deciding to stop the chat, she brought up the quest she has just taken. "We ARE here to grind, aren't we?" she asked. This caught the two others off guard as they did intend to get the quest done and move ASAP.

"Yeah, we are." Came Shino's reply, as she motioned Kazuto to say something, which he did. "As you already know, I want the **Anneal Blade** , and as we kill more Nepents, the drop rate is going to get higher and higher. So I'd like you, Shino, to take the quest as well, as we can sell the blade later."

Hearing that, Shino went and took the quest before taking off into the jungle.

~Time skip: 6 hours.

It was now 4PM in the afternoon and the three friends were still grinding, Maho having shown the two others her **Unique Skill** and the **Mimung** beforehand.

Eventually, somebody also came into the forest and, due to sheer coincidence, they met up. "Hey there! I didn't expect anybody to appear here before me. You guys are from the beta as well, huh?" Irelia ( **Insert A/N: I will mention their in-game names if there are any other persons apart from the 3 around** ) was the first to respond. "I'm not. Those two are." After that, the man introduced himself as Coper and told them that he was also farming **Little Nepents**.

' _Great,'_ he thought. _'That green-eyed girl seems like a newb to me. She hasn't even got a new rapier at this stage. Also, I bet that she's probably saved up a lot of col for me to get, along with the_ _ **Anneal Blade**_ _. I'll just MPK them should the other two get in the way._ ' With that, he decided to lure them into a trap. "How about us hunting the **Little Nepents** together? The drop rate is always higher this way. And don't worry, you don't have to invite me into a party."

Hearing this, Kirito and Sinon decided that it is fine to let Coper tag along. Irelia didn't have anything against it either, so he did tag along.

After 45 minutes of grinding, three **Little Nepents** with flowers popped up already and the three friends got their ovules. Coper bade his time with slashing **Little Nepents** , waiting for his trap to appear. Five minutes later, it did indeed happen.

As a **Little Nepent** With a fruit attached onto its head appeared, Kirito didn't give it a second thought as he thought Coper knew how to deal with it; Killing it and not touching the fruit. But as he stole a glance to the man, he noticed Coper's apologetic look in his eyes.

With that, he knew what was going to happen. Coper slashed the **Little Nepent** right through the fruit, which was going to attract other plants to this location, and went into hiding, as he had chosen the **Hiding** skill. Kirito, having put one skill slot into the **Searching** skill, found Coper hiding in a bush, which encouraged him to run past Coper's hiding spot, with the two girls following him.

Coper, not knowing if Kirito running past him was actually planned or not, decided to not run and stay in the spot. Little did he know that hiding doesn't work against monsters that aren't relying on sight, as the **Little Nepents** did.

This proved to be fatal for him, as he became one of the many casualties in the first month after the official release of SAO.

Irelia, seeing that Coper was dead, pulled out her **Mimung** and her **Chronokeeper** and decided to turn on the plant monsters. Activating the **Twisting Clouds** skill, basically a skill that made the blades rotate for 3 seconds around a spot with increasing radius every second, on her **Chronokeeper** , she noticed that there was, unlike with normal **Sword Skills** , no system assist in placing these unique **Sword Skills**.

But having the experience of using the weapon, she placed the blades between her and the **Little Nepents** , just close enough that the DEF reduction didn't apply. The blades started to glow and the gears on the fuller started turning as the combo started to slash apart the plants with relative ease, killing half of them in the three seconds it was active.

Meanwhile, Kirito and Sinon were also busy, as they both also turned around. Sinon activated **Shadow Strike** , a fast one-hit, high damage dagger skill with a possibility of a 1-sec stun, whilst Kirito activated his **Horizontal** , hitting multiple monsters at once, finishing what the two others started already.

After a few moments of respite, Kirito went off to the spot where he assumed Coper died. His assumption was correct as he found Coper's **Small Sword** at the spot he died. Stabbing the battered blade into the ground, he put a fourth ovule that he acquired whilst fighting the last few plants in front of the grave marker.

' _You could've been a friend, Coper, if you hadn't been so greedy._ ' These were his last parting thoughts as he slowly moved back to the waiting friends.

~Time Skip: 45 minutes

The three friends arrived in the village of **Horunka** with the classical playful banter they were all used to from their real-life meetings, not a trace of sadness present that reigned over them 45 minutes ago.

When they arrived, they parted ways with the intention of rotating around town; Kazuto went to complete the quest first, Shino went shopping and Maho visited the Blacksmith of the village. Then they would change tasks, Shino visiting the smithy, Maho completing the quest, and so on.

30 minutes later, they were all done with what they had to do and were absolutely exhausted. Deciding to grab a dinner and turn in for the rest of the day, the party searched for the little restaurant they knew was in this town.

Whilst they were eating, they noticed how many levels they acquired. Maho was now level 9, halfway to 10, Kazuto and Shino were both 7, three quarters to 8. Kazuto invested 11 stat points into STR and 7 into AGI, whilst Shino did the opposite (Kazuto: 13 STR, 8 AGI; Shino: 8 STR, 13 AGI). Both also got a skill slot. Kazuto then chose **Parry** , whilst Shino chose **Hiding**.

Maho already had 10 STR and 8 AGI points distributed in the beginning of the game and ended up getting 4 extra STR and 5 extra AGI points, meaning that her stats were at 14 and 13. She hasn't acquired any new skills as of yet, but that would soon change.

~Time Skip: 1 Month. (December 3rd, 2022)

The next month of SAO would probably go into the history as the bloodiest time of the whole game to come. More than 2000 people died so far and people are starting to lose hope as even the 1st floor remained un-cleared. This didn't apply for three certain players, though, who never stopped power-grinding up until now.

Kirito was now level 12, having used his XP-boost very well. He got his 5th skill slot, which he invested into **First** **Aid**. He also gained 7 STR and 8 AGI points, which totals him to 20 STR and 16 AGI points total.

Sinon was also level 12 now, having equally effectively utilized her XP boost. She also got her 5th skill, **Acrobatics** , whilst investing 8 STR and 7 AGI points into the traits, bringing her to 16 STR and 20 AGI.

Maho's development was probably the most impressive as she was now level 16, but taking her extended XP-boost into account, it was clear that she had out-scaled the two others because of that. She also gained a 5th skill; Battle Healing. Her stat points were distributed rather to the AGI-heavy side, investing 14 points into AGI and the half into STR, meaning that she had 21 STR but 27 AGI.

These three now also had contact with Argo, **The Rat** ; an info-broker from the closed beta who was friends with Kirito and Sinon. The three contributed the most to the **Beginner's Guide** which was distributed in the stores for free, getting a permanent 33% off on Argo's intel. Sinon was the first to use this connection as she sold her **Anneal Blade** +2 for 30000 col to some player named Kibaou. Also, Argo told them that there was a boss-raid meeting in **Tolbana** that day at 10AM. (Which was for free, mind you.)

~At the raid meeting, **Tolbana**

"Hello everybody and welcome to our boss-raid meeting. My name is Diavel, and I consider myself as a knight." Sounded the cheery voice of a blue-haired man standing in the middle of a Romanic stage. This caused the most people to erupt in laughter and some to say that there was no job system in SAO. Obviously, the knight joke was only to lighten the mood, but that simply went by four certain people, three sitting together and the fourth one a bit away, that were sitting there, with two of them having a hood on.

"Today, my party found the door to the first floor boss. This meeting is there for everybody that wishes to fight alongside us and beat the floor. Today, we are going to beat the boss, and show everybody on this floor that the death game can be beaten. Everybody here shares this duty! Isn't this so?" Diavel continued, this time around no trace of happiness present in his voice.

With that, the crowd was stunned, processing what the 'knight' had just said. After thinking it through, some people started clapping, erupting in cheers even, which was the desired effect of Diavel's speech.

"OK. With this said, let's start planning. First, get into groups of six people, as solo players will only get themselves killed in the dungeon." With that, the people quickly formed groups of six, leaving the aforementioned four players out of it. The 46 people present formed 7 parties of six and a party of 3, leaving one hooded person alone, which didn't go unnoticed by Kirito.

' _I better invite her into the party. Nobody should be left alone, not even on the first floor._ ' With that in mind, he made her way to that person, who, apart from her auburn hood, wore white stockings and boots matching with her hood. She had a **Wind Fleuret** , a rare monster drop rapier, equipped to her and some strands of chestnut hair exposed from under her hood, which were the only recognizable details apart from the pale skin she had.

"Hey, you there." Kirito spoke up, "Want to join us? It's not like you are allowed to fight alone, you know." The person simply nodded and Kirito invited her into the party, which she accepted after a short moment of hesitation. With that, the two returned to the Irelia and Sinon, both stunned by the name of the player who had joined their party; **Asuna**.

' _Asuna, is that you?_ ' Maho asked herself, but was ripped out of her thoughts by Sinon, just in time for Diavel to speak up again.

"Well, have you all partied up? Then-" "WAIT!" He was interrupted by a man with orange, spiky hair who was wearing a chainmail vest and had a **Anneal Blade** equipped. Said man stood atop the top row of the tribune and started jumping down, reaching ground level in a few jumps, sliding to a hold.

After that, he pointed his index finger into the crowd and screamed: "Before anything, my name is Kibaou. And some of you need to apologize right now to the two thousand people who have died so far."

Noticing Sinon sitting in the crowd, he shouted: "Especially you, missy," whilst pointing his finger in Sinon's direction, getting a frown on the three faces, one obstructed by a hood.

Diavel, who decided that he heard enough, spoke up: "Kibaou-san, are you currently speaking of the beta-testers?" Kibaou, outraged by such an obvious question shouted: "Of course I am! Who else could I be referring to? On the day this god-damned game started, the beta-testers just left us beginners here to rot, stealing the best XP and col locations with the easiest quests, and got off the radar. Thus getting stronger than all of us! This lowly scum should come down here and apologize, giving us all the items and col they have. Otherwise, they shall not participate in this raid!"

Sinon, having had enough of Kibaou's rant, decided to stand up and face that bastard. "May I speak up?" she rhetorically asked as she walked onto the stage, getting out a **Beginner's Guide** in the process. "So, Kibaou-san, you are saying that all the beta-testers have left the beginners alone to die, thus having to compensate and take responsibility. Am I right?"

Not waiting for his response, she continued, relentlessly assaulting and picking apart Kibaou's arguments. "Does everybody have one of these?" She asked, as she got a nod of confirmation from all the people present, encouraging her to continue.

"All this information was acquired by the beta-testers working together. Can somebody read the creators of the section **Sword Skills** , **Basic Survival** and **Stats and Skills: a simple How to**?" With that, a tall black man spoke up: "They are **Kirito** , **Sinon** , and **Irelia** , respectively," Making Sinon grin.

"But Still! How the heck are we supposed to know where they are now" Kibaou shouted angrily at Sinon, not knowing her identity. The girl simply curtsied, speaking up: "Kirito, Irelia and Sinon. At your service." She said, motioning to her friends, who both gave the crowd small bows.

This silenced the orange-haired man for good, whilst little murmurs in the crowd broke out. "Whoa, these are the major contributors to this guide! They must be strong!" Were some of them.

"I hope that you now understand what we did to help the beginners, who, despite proper instructions, still died." Came her final statement as she moved back to her seat.

After this little intermission by Kibaou and Sinon, Diavel finally could continue. "As Sinon already stated, there is the Beginner's Guide, which has been updated today."

This made the crowd go up in ooohs while Diavel continued. "The guide now contains information about the first floor boss, **Illfang the Kobold Lord**. It has four health bars and wields a bone axe with a shield. It is also said, that he will drop said weapons in favor of a Talwar if his last HP-bar is in the red zone. Also, it is guarded by monsters called **Ruin Kobold Sentinels** that spawn after entering the boss room and after depleting each of the HP-bars."

After that statement on the boss, he paused a little to let the information soak in. a few seconds passed as he decided to continue. "Our main strategy will be using two tank parties to hold the boss' agro, switching out when one gets low, whilst striking with two DpS parties. The remaining groups hold the minions off from the fighting parties. This concludes the briefing. I expect you all tomorrow at 10AM. Sharp."

With this in mind, the group disbanded, biding their time for the day. Sinon decided to get lunch for the group whilst Kirito was hanging around Irelia and Asuna, who still hadn't taken her hood off.

Eventually, Asuna spoke up, not knowing what to do. "I'll go and use the rest of the day grinding," she said in an emotionless voice, whilst she started walking. "Well, I am certainly powered out… might as well take a shower till Sinon returns." Irelia stated.

This statement caused Asuna to freeze in her path, thoughts swirling in her head. "You can shower in the game? I haven't showered in a month…" She realized too late that she spoke this out loud, much to Kirito's and Irelia's surprise.

"Well, you can always use the shower in Kirito's room, as he is heading to the shops right now. Shouldn't be a problem, should it?" Irelia spoke, clearly wanting to have some alone-time to sort out her thoughts. Kirito saw that and agreed, as he also had a few issues he wanted to sort out.

"This is Sinon's Key to our room. Just don't loose it." He says. Giving her a Key to the inn, which she accepted. "Irelia will show you to the room. I have to get going now, see you soon at the inn." He concluded, leaving the two girls to their things, who both eventually went showering.

~Maho's PoV (1st person)

After showing Asuna to Kirito's room, I went into my own bathroom, thoughts about my little sister still whirling in my head whilst I started un-equipping all my things (including underwear, of course) to get into the shower. In the shower, my thoughts really started running as I thought about everything whilst the warm water was running along my bare form.

' _Can this even be Asuna? I don't know whether she could've even joined this game… but if it is, I mustn't associate myself with her. Having a **Unique Skill** , I must hide it as I could get hunted down for it… Also, I have to make sure that she survives, even at the cost of my life._'

' _… also, I can't afford to get myself in a dire situation anymore. One mistake, and my life could be gone, and Asuna's life probably would be gone with it, if it is Asuna…_ '

' _Although I don't know what is going to happen after the boss fight, but I have a feeling that Kazuto and Shino will split up from me and Asuna… I've got to keep her safe, even if she isn't my sister._ '

~general PoV, time skip: 30 mins

The party was eating the take-away food Shino brought in hers and Kazuto's room. Asuna had decided to go grinding and took the restaurant-made sandwich with her into the dungeon.

Sinon and Maho were talking about the real-life and how it used to be, discussing family when Maho brought up a rather sensitive subject to her; her sister Asuna. "Do you think that it could be her?" She asked, which caught her companion off-guard.

"Well, her name is the same, and judging by the hair-color, it could pretty well be…" came her rationalized reply. "At least Kazuto doesn't know my sister personally… but still… this could be bad."

Sinon just chuckled. "Well, if we're going to get separated, I want you to keep her safe, even if you're not related and such." "Of course, it'd be against me to leave somebody behind and rot…" came Maho's reply. "Let's go grinding. I need something to get my head clear." With that, Shino's neutral expression soon changed into a grinning one as they went grinding.

~Kazuto's and Asuna's PoV (3rd person), time skip: 5 hours

It was 7PM in the evening as Kazuto found Asuna sitting on a bench, eating a bread with a semi-disgusted expression.

Deciding to walk up to her, he thought about how to approach her. In the end, he just asked for a seat, to which she didn't reply, so he simply sat down with her. "It's tasty, isn't it?" He asked, trying to start a conversation. To his amazement, she even replied. "Is that so? I can't believe so."

"I eat one every day, since I got here… but I like to mix things up once in a while." He stated, whilst pulling out a little jar and a bread of his own. "Try using this on her bread." He told her, which she did after a few seconds. ' _Cream?_ ' She thought, as Kirito applied a bit of cream on his own bread.

Once Kirito started to chew on his own bread, Asuna was dwelling in her own thoughts. Pushing those aside, she decided to start eating her bread, although what hit her was very different than she expected. Instead of the standard, dull taste of the bread, the taste reproduction engine made it taste like a cheesecake. Noticing that, she devoured the bread of hers while Kirito was still chewing on his first piece.

Deciding to trust him a bit more, she spoke up this time. "I'm not here to eat good food, though. I am here so that I can stay myself. I'd rather stay myself than rot away in a inn somewhere in the **Starting City**. So even if I get killed, I'll die as myself, not losing to this game, this world even. I wouldn't be able to see my onee-chan otherwise. She gave up basically everything so that I could be myself, and I am not about to let that go to waste."

Kirito, noticing the resolve in her voice when she talked about her big sister, decided to give her advice. "Well, as of now, I am respecting your nee-san, although I do not know her. She has given her all for you and you better not let that go to waste dying. Also, we don't want a party member dying on us. So please, don't die. You'd be wasting so much effort put into you. Both by us and by your nee-san."

After these words were spoken, the conversation died down. Eventually, they both went back indoors to get some sleep, Asuna getting a room for herself, not knowing that her sibling was right there next to her room, thrashing about in her bed because of said chestnut-haired girl.

 **To be continued.**

 **A/N: Well, I hope that you enjoyed this chapter, as it took me 15+ hrs of work to write this thing down. If you have any questions, plot holes, errors, etc, please leave a review or a PM. Constructive criticism is always appreciated as well as normal feedback. Also a thank you for everyone who has taken their time to review this story, I am very happy about it.**

 **That's about all I have to say, so thanks for reading!**

 **Ja ne!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **EDIT (11/SEP/16) Included time-stamps, fixed minor grammar**


	3. Aria of a Starless Night

**A/N: Hey and welcome back. I am thankful for all the support this story is getting and am happy to post this 3** **rd** **chapter. As always, feel free to PM me if you have any questions and leave a review if you found any typing/grammar/plot errors.**

 **Enough of that, though. Now enjoy the friends beating up Illfang.**

 **~Irelia Yuuki.**

 **DISCLAIMER: see chp.1**

~Maho's PoV (1st person) (December 4th, 2022)

I woke up after a rough dream, leaving my virtual character sweat-drenched and me deprived of sleep. ' _Wow, what a dream_ ' I thought, whilst looking at the clock. It was 9AM and I should get moving. Moving to the bathroom, I decided to take a shower before heading out.

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV (3rd person)

Kazuto experienced a rather rough awakening call in form of a pillow to the face, thrown by yours truly, Shino. "Wake up! Sleepyhead!" Grumbling something about nothing being wrong with sleeping longer, Kazuto stood up.

"Go and take a shower." With that statement, Shino practically shoved Kazuto into the bathroom and waited, because she took one before waking Kazuto up.

After he came out of the shower, the two went over their equipment before heading out to get breakfast with the others.

~Asuna's PoV (1st person)

I woke up from a nightmare about my sister, of whom I know is trapped in SAO. ' _My god, I can't afford letting her die!_ ' I thought, whilst trying to keep calm and head to the bathroom, using the shower function I learned about yesterday. ' _I'll grow stronger. For her. I'll protect her and clear the game, for she gave up her freedom to grant it to me, I shall give mine to grant it to her._ '

With that resolve made while showering, I went to search Kirito and Shino, thoughts about that 'Irelia' girl swirling in my mind, her having a familiar aura and all that.

~General PoV:

Kirito, Sinon and Asuna all met up at the restaurant near the inn they were staying in and were enjoying breakfast. Irelia was absent because she had sent Kirito an message that she still had some things to do, trying to mask her true motives, which lied in sorting out her thoughts.

Kirito, bothered a bit by the silence during the meal, decided to make some conversation to break it. "So, you need anything for the boss fight?" He asked, just to receive a "Nope! Got everything" as reply from the two girls at the same time, causing both to blush.

Luckily for Asuna, though, is that her face was hidden beneath her hood, meaning that her blush wouldn't show.

Kirito, not bothering about the girls' blushes just continued, not seeing a reason to tease them. (Not yet, mind you.) "Good, because if you did have something to get, we'd have to leave now. It's like half past nine already."

"Well, even if you did need anything, I would've gotten it by now as I went to the stores and got all the things I needed just now." Irelia interjected, causing the three to look at her hooded figure. Kirito was the first one who noticed a trade menu popping up in front of him, containing a healing crystal and a few health pots. The others soon noticed trade windows of their own as Irelia continued to talk.

"So, we should get going now, I personally want to arrive a bit earlier than the rest, so that we're not the last ones there." She reasoned, as being timely was also a trait of her personality. The group agreed and they made their way to the theatre, which took roughly 15 minutes.

Another 15 minutes later, 45 out of the 46 players present at the meeting were there, Kibaou being the missing one. "Where is that guy?" Sinon asked, annoyance clear in her voice. "First he flames the beta-testers for no reason at all then he doesn't show up! What the fuck is wrong with him?" she continued on, her usually calm and collected personality quickly changing into the hot-headed nature of hers.

Five minutes passed and the bad mood had spread across the whole party, although they're simply mad about Kibaou's latency. Diavel had finally had enough of this and decided to move on, resulting in sighs of relief from most of the people who didn't want to wait any longer.

~time skip: 1hr

The players of the clearing group was walking in direction of the dungeon when they heard a loud voice, causing them to look back. "WAAAAIIIT!" Shouted none other than our favorite cactus-head Kibaou, who was currently running down the road towards the raid party.

"I'm sorry that I am late! I had some stuff to resupply, and then missed the departure and then I got lost and-" "Never mind that now, Kibaou, you're here now and that's all that matters." Diavel interrupted his series of apologies. "Let's continue on, guys. The boss isn't gonna commit suicide anytime soon." He said, leaving Kibaou astonished.

Not only had Diavel forgiven him for his latency, but he also didn't show any interest in Kibaou's excuses, which made Kibaou extremely thankful for having such a leader in command.

After that intermission from Kibaou, the group continued on in silence, making Kirito and Sinon extremely uncomfortable. Deciding to just break this silence, Sinon brought up some… rather embarrassing scenes from the beta.

"Kirito-kun, I hope that you now know better than to run into my picks and knives again, don't you? We ARE in a death game after all…" She said, causing an instantaneous blush to appear on Kirito's avatar, and a laugh to spread in the raid party. Being the type of boy that didn't let such a comment sit on himself, he decided to retort.

"Sinon, I do need to remind you that the times I actually got hurt by you were the times you actually aimed at the back of my head. You're called the 'Sniper of ice' but you don't seem to be accurate enough to live up to the name of a sniper." He said, getting even more laughs from the group, Sinon included.

Eventually, the playful banter from the group died down and the mood went back to a rather nervous and anxious one. Eventually, Kirito had enough of the silence and decided to go over their strategy once more.

"… and when both Irelia and I are on cooldown, you switch in and hopefully deal extra damage to the target." He explained, making Asuna stop in her tracks.

"…What's a switch?" She asked, causing Kazuto to facepalm, forgetting that she had probably never been in a party before.

"When another party member is frozen from the sword skills they used, another player, the player they switch with, takes their position and follows up on their damage, sometimes also delaying their assault. This is simply called the 'switch'." Irelia quickly interjected, not wanting to embarrass Asuna even more.

Asuna, now understanding the switch mechanic, nodded in confirmation as the group continued on with their journey to the boss room of the first floor dungeon.

70 minutes have passed and the clearing group reached the place in front of the boss room with everybody a bit exhausted. Thus, they decided to take a little break of 5 minutes to eat and drink something.

After the break, Diavel slammed his sword into the ground, gaining everybody's attention. "So, before we start the boss fight, I want to clarify some things. The **Last-Attack Bonus** goes to the person that gets it, the XP will be distributed equally throughout the group and the gold will go to the party that gets the kill. They will distribute it among themselves. Any objections?"

As everybody kept still, he continued. "Good. Now let's show this boss who is boss." With that, the players opened the door, revealing a room that is roughly 20m x 100m large, containing Illfang.

Illfang let out a ferocious battle cry and the boss battle began with the boss spawning his **Ruin Kobold Sentinels**.

Eventually, Asuna unleashed a **Quadruple pain** , finishing off one of the boss' last minions. She was watched by Kirito, whom she switched with, who was gawking then. ' _Wow, her sword is so fast, I can't see its tip._ ' He thought.

Soon after, the boss dropped to its last HP bar and there were still no casualties. His minions were disposed of quickly and its HP were dropping as fast as a slime from the 1st floor. Eventually, the HP reached the red zone of said bar, meaning that the boss would change weapons and enter rage mode.

This was when Diavel changed the originally intended plan. "Back off, everybody, I've got this!" He shouted, making everybody back off the boss. Kirito, seeing that the boss actually drew an nōdachi instead of a talwar, watched in horror as the modification couldn't mean any good to the party.

"Diavel! Be careful! It's an nōdachi, not a talwar!" He shouted as a desperate attempt to warn the blue-haired raid-party leader, who was currently charging up a mid-level sword skill.

He however, didn't pay Kirito's words any attention as he continued to charge the boss, victory certain in his mind.

This thought was quickly dispelled as Illfang started jumping around the boss lair, its AI deducting the biggest threat to him. Sadly though, Diavel was (wrongly) recognized as such and Illfang charged up a sword skill whilst jumping towards Diavel.

The blue-haired man was knocked to the ground, his chest area bearing a huge wound. Kirito, being the first one who noticed that, rushed to his side only to see his HP quickly fading.

Irelia wouldn't have any of that though, as she pulled out a **Healing Crystal** from her pouch and used it whilst sprinting to Kirito's side, healing his HP to 50%.

"Why?" he asked as she ignored his question and shoved an incredulously expensive **Teleport Crystal** into his hand and muttered: "Teleport; **Tolbana**." Not intending to disappear with him, she decided to simply stand up and draw her blade.

Diavel's forced teleport from Irelia was taken wrongly as nobody actually saw the teleport crystal being used, thus everybody thought that their leader was dead, losing the will to fight as result. Also, the boss started tearing up the parties, trying to take as many out as he could. Agil, noticing that Asuna and Kirito were just standing there, decided to just shout at them.

"JUST WHAT ARE YOU DOING? WE'RE FIGHTING A BOSS HERE SO STOP STANDING AROUND AND START FIGHTING."

This finally got Kirito and Asuna out of the trance like state they were in from Irelia's actions and they resumed thinking, and thus also resumed acting. "I'll strike the boss' sword aside and you three do damage to him!" Asuna shouted, getting a confirmation from Sinon, Irelia and Kirito.

Asuna saw the boss charge up a sword skill and went for it. Starting a **Linear** , she tried to parry the skill of Illfang by meeting his nōdachi with her rapier. Her **Wind Fleuret** met Illfang's weapon slightly off center to the left, causing his blade to steer in another direction, cancelling the sword skill.

Although his sword skill was cancelled, his sword was still traveling, hitting Asuna's cloak and ripping it apart, revealing the beautiful face beneath it.

~Irelia's PoV (1st person)

I watched in astonishment as Asuna landed that perfect **Linear** on the boss, throwing it off balance and ready for me to follow up. As I unleashed a **Shooting Star** on my **rapière rose** , a rapier made of rose-red steel and a guard shaped like the bloom a rose, I noticed that Asuna's cloak was ripped off by the boss, revealing the face of none other than my sister's.

' _So she really is my sister, isn't she? Man, Asuna, if we ever get out of this alive, you're going to be in soooo much trouble._ ' Was the only thing I thought as I continued to slash the boss with my sword, and eventually switching out to Kirito.

~General PoV

After Irelia was finished, Kirito unleashed a **Slant** , trying to abort the boss' sword skill yet again, only to meet open air instead of the blade he was expecting his **Anneal Blade** to hit. Illfang then replied by using a **Ukifune** on Kirito, knocking him into Asuna and Irelia, effectively stunning the latter.

Kirito's HP were around half, same with Asuna's, and the boss stood towering in front of them. Even a moron could see that this situation was a fatal one as Illfang lifted his blade to deliver the final blow.

As Illfang brought the weapon down to kill the three, two throwing picks flew towards him and one of them embedded itself into an eye, partially blinding the beast. The nōdachi itself was interrupted by a **Whirlwind** from Agil, blocking the blade.

"Go back and heal, we got this situation covered." He said, earning him a grateful nod from all of them. And as luck would have it, just after they've healed up, Illfang slashed around him to rid himself of the players surrounding him, knocking them back a fair distance. After that, he leaped in the air to activate **Tsumujiguruma** , intent on killing them all with one blow.

Kirito noticed this and activated a **Rage Spike** , trying to hit the boss whilst still channeling. This succeeded and Kirito landed with a roll, which he followed into a sprint towards the boss. "Asuna! Irelia! To me! Sinon! Hit its eyes!" The three girls gave affirmative and the last assault began.

Kirito, Asuna and Irelia ran towards the boss, all three of them drawing their blades and starting sword skills. As Kirito's **Vertical** was about to land, Sinon hit Illfang with one of her throwing knives, her aim not letting her down in this moment of importance. The melee fighters used this opening as they all charged in at the temporarily flinching boss and attacked.

As Kirito was on cooldown from his **Vertical** , it was Irelia's turn. Having recently unlocked the **Diagonal Hexagon** , (a mid-level rapier sword skill consisting of three diagonal crossing slashes, forming a hexagon, and a stab at the crossing point of the slashes, stunning the enemy) she activated just that, effectively continuing to hold the boss in check.

Then, Asuna came in and activated **Quadruple Pain** , extending the stun duration on the boss and damaging him enough so that the next hit would kill him.

Kirito, having just passed his freeze period, activated a **Vertical Arc** whilst sprinting towards the boss, intent on getting the killing blow as both girls were on cooldown from their sword skills.

The sword skill hit home and Kirito cut him diagonally from the upper-right to the lower-left side. Continuing the 2-hit combo, he came in from below and started splitting the boss in half, resulting in his blade having gone through the now dead boss's entire body and then some.

As the boss exploded, everybody went silent at the display of prowess by the four players, comboing 25% of the enraged boss's HP bar in merely a few seconds. Then, everybody cheered as the CONGRATULATION notice popped up and almost everybody got a level-up.

But one could almost say that the happy mood didn't last long at all as Kibaou decided to ruin it. "Why?" He asked, silencing everyone.

"Why did you let him die?" he continued, this time having an accusing tone of voice. Suddenly, the people were angry at the players who they just celebrated a few moments ago.

~Kazuto's PoV (1st person)

' _This is bad, if it goes on like this, everybody will hate the beta-testers._ ' I thought as I went through the options I had. Deciding to take the anger and hate on me, I wanted to speak up.

Getting nudged in the ribs by Sinon's elbow wasn't in my expectations though.

"Whatever you plan on doing, I am helping." She said. Gods she knew me way too well as I was indeed planning on doing something rather ridiculous. With that in mind, I nodded, hoping that she wouldn't try and kill me after I was done.

Just as I decided to speak up, Irelia beat me to it. "So. Diavel didn't actually die, Kibaou. I Teleported him to **Tolbana** , not wanting him to disrupt the raid even more than he already had done after I saved his life. Greed is something we don't need in these life and death situations." This statement silenced some of the murmurs, but not all.

This astounded Kibaou but he didn't falter. "But still. Why didn't you share what you knew with us then? This simply shows us that the beta-testers are actually a bunch of selfish bastards!" He said, trying to ignite the burning hatred for the beta-testers once again. This was the time when we (me and Sinon) both received a message from Irelia.

" **I have the feeling that you're going to do something. Do it if you want to, but know that our ways will part for a while if you do so. I have a sister to take care of. I'll keep in touch, though.** "

Knowing this, I started to laugh. Maniacally. "A beta-tester? Don't even dare to compare me to these noobs." I said after I was done laughing. Then, to my surprise, Sinon joined in with an exceptionally cold laugh, the laugh that added the 'Ice' part in her nickname.

"90% of the 1000 beta-testers were just amateurs who don't even know how to level. Even you are above them." She said, surprising everyone.

"But we are different. In the beta, we reached floors higher than anyone else in the game, fighting monsters with more advanced attack patterns in the process. This is the reason that I knew the boss' attack pattern. But wait, there's more. During my days in the beta, I gathered a lot of information on the game. Probably more than any info-broker." I continued, astonishing them even more.

It seems like Kibaou has caught up to my words, and he started to speak. "But that makes you a cheater! A fucking filthy cheater!" He shouted whilst everybody joined in, not knowing that I didn't give a shit about what people thought of me online.

"You're a beta-tester and a cheater! So you're a Beater!" Somebody in the crowd shouted, to which I simply grinned.

"Beater… That's a good name. That's right. I am a Beater. So from now on, don't compare me with those beta-testers." I said, whilst opening my menu and searching for a certain item. After I found said item, I equipped it. It was the **Coat of Midnight** , the **Last-Attack Bonus** from this boss.

That being said and done, I turned and walked to the second floor entrance, Sinon already waiting for me at the stairs.

~General PoV

Whilst Kirito and Sinon took on the Beater status, Irelia pulled her sister aside, not wanting her to follow up. "Whatever you do, don't follow them." She said, which got Asuna angry. "And who exactly are you to talk to me like that?" came her reply, which made Irelia remember that Asuna still didn't know her identity.

"Somebody who has the right to talk to you like that." Irelia said, not fazed at all about her sister's unknowing disrespect for somebody she held in such high regards.

This response silenced Asuna, who was unusually loud lately, her respectful and calm side fading into her hot-headed and stubborn side. "Okay." Was the only thing she said, after which she ran after Kirito.

"Kirito-kun! Wait!" Kirito stopped climbing the stairs and turned around, waiting for her to continue. "You said my name in the boss fight, right?"

"Sorry that I addressed you informally. Or did I pronounce it wrong?" came his reply, his tone still holding its slightly cold edge. Asuna, completely unfazed by the answer, just asked one question. "How did you know it?" She spoke, enticing a chuckle from Sinon.

"You can see a few HP bars around here that isn't your own. The person's name is always written next to it." He said, mentioning to where he assumed was the upper left corner of her field of view.

Asuna, now noticing the HP-bars, laughed. "So that's where they were all the time!"

Just shrugging over the unexpected reaction, Sinon spoke up. "You're strong. If somebody you trust invites you into a guild, join it. There are limits to what us solo players can do in this game." This made Asuna frown, though. "But what about you?" She asked, being seriously concerned for the two people in front of her."

"We'll hold up." Was everything Kirito said before disbanding the party and inviting Sinon into a new one, who accepted without hesitation. In the end, they both simply left for the 2nd floor of Aincrad. Irelia, having just caught up to Asuna, did the same.

~Asuna's and Maho's PoV

"So. Do you mind telling me why you didn't let me go after them?" Asuna asked, accusation in her voice, seriously asking herself why she abided by Irelia's words.

The hooded girl simply told her that she would tell her when they got to an inn, silencing Asuna once more. (Even though this time, it was out of curiosity.)

~Time skip: 3 hours

When they got to **Urbus** , they saw that Kirito and Sinon already opened the Teleport gate, which was the reason why the city was bustling with players.

Irelia was hungry, not having had lunch the way over here, so she asked Asuna if they wanted to go eat lunch as she knew of a nice restaurant near where they were. Asuna, still dwelling in her thoughts, simply nodded.

~In the restaurant

Irelia was just ordering some random dish from the waitress as Asuna brought up the questions she was bothered with. "Just who are you? You seem familiar to me…" she asked, earning her a friendly smile from Irelia.

"I am seriously still wondering why you haven't figured it out yet... whatever. I hope this answers your questions." She said, un-equipping her hood and, to be honest, shocking her sister by doing so.

"Onee-chan?!" She asked, being completely shocked about the identity of the previously mysterious (to her, at least) player.

"Yes, Asuna, indeed. And as we both know, you're in for a big scolding when we get to the inn." She said, making Asuna gulp in fear. If her sister was ever mad, she was really mad.

After they were done eating, Irelia rented them both a room for the night. Acting completely polite, one couldn't possibly know that she was incredibly mad unless one knew her well… very well.

After the girl closed the door, her demeanor changed completely. The usually smiling face was replaced by a frown and her usually friendly eyes were as cold as ice, if not, colder.

All this made Asuna seriously fear for what was to come, as she knew for a fact that her onee-chan wouldn't approve of her going off to fight a boss like that.

"So, Asuna. Care to explain why you joined the boss-raid, even though you knew that I was in the game and that I wouldn't approve you doing so?" Maho asked, sounding absolutely emotionless.

"I… dunno, honestly. I knew that you were in this game and that you'd probably try and help everyone, keeping me safe in the process. But I didn't want to rot in an Inn like you'd probably tell me to. I don't want to lose to Kayaba." She said, being honestly nothing but apologetic.

This earned her an exasperated sigh from Maho, who was in a serious dilemma right now. She could either keep Asuna with her, ensuring her safety and having a helping hand, or she could leave Asuna, trusting her that she'd stay alive, and join Kazuto and Shino. This option was also attractive because she then didn't need to deal with Asuna getting pegged as a Beater.

Deciding not to think more about it and asking her sister, she went ahead. "So, Asuna, I am not really mad about this anymore, as you've sufficiently explained your reasons. But don't get me wrong. Dying is not an option in this game. Now, we have two possible plans of action. The first one would be that I stick with you, keeping you safe and being a helping hand. The second option would be that I leave you to your devices, joining up with Kirito and Sinon. This is attractive for both of us because we don't need to worry about you being a Beater."

After she was done, Asuna was shocked. Her sister, who had tried to protect her, gave her the chance to act for herself. This alone was actually unexpected as Maho was overprotective in every aspect that regarded her little sister.

After a few minutes of silence, Asuna made her choice. "Onee-chan, I think I have made my decision. As much as I want to be with you right now, I can't. I have the feeling that I'd only hold you back. Also, even if we went separate ways, we'll still work together whilst fighting bosses. That's good enough for me. But I still have one question."

"Go ahead." was all Maho said, accompanied by an inquiring look in her eyes. "Why do you let me go alone?" she asked, taking the older girl by surprise as she hasn't expected such an naive question. Reminding herself that Asuna wasn't as mature as her (she was living alone in the US, after all), she answered in all honesty.

"During my time in the US, I learned a lot of things. Some of them not so good. but that aside, i really learned to trust other people of our age. Even though i didn't see a lot of other teenagers attending university, the few i saw, mostly 16-year-old sophomores, were actually a lot more mature than i thought they would be. I think that you're good enough to survive and win this game. Also, i'd like to finally put some faith into my sister, of whom i trust that she must have matured a lot over the years." Hearing this, Asuna nodded, only muttering a silent "Arigato."

After that was said, Maho sighed once more, before returning to her usual happy mood. "Nice. Now I think we have a lot of catching up to do. I haven't had a lot of time in the past few months and neither have you. So start talking. Do you like any boys? Or are you too scared that they will all be shooed away?" "Eeeeh?"

After Asuna caught herself from her third shock today, she started catching up with her sister, talking through most of the afternoon. They talked about anything and everything, apart from Maho's experiences in the US.

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV, Time skip: -1 hour:

Shino was exhausted. Plain and simple. After 'outing' herself and Kazuto as Beaters, opening the gate to the 2nd floor and hiding from everybody, she now was sitting on the bed in the inn room she and Kazuto were sharing. "Damn. I didn't think you'd do something this ridiculous. You sure got me there, Kazuto-kun."

"Well, you didn't have to play along, you know?" Kazuto replied, not understanding the joke behind Shino's statement. "But I still wonder who Maho's sister is…"

Shino, forgetting for a moment that Kazuto had never met Asuna IRL before, started answering. "It's clear as day, isn't it? Oh, I forgot, you don't know her sister. It's Asuna."

"Sure haven't expected that." He said, a not-so shocked look on his face.

"Soooooooo. Wanna get something to eat?" Shino asked whilst her stomach was growling, only proving the fact that she was hungry.

"Sure."

~Time skip: 45mins

The two players were sitting in one of the many restaurants **Urbus** housed when Kirito received a message from Argo.

" **Ki-Bou and Sinonon, you've got somebody that wants to meet you. Also, some cactus-head is tailing you.** "

"Damn. Sinon, we got to go. Kibaou's tailing us right now, according to the rat." Kirito said, honestly surprised that Kibaou had caught up to them so quickly.

Sinon just shrugged, saying that she was done eating anyways, and that she was ready to go. After that, the two paid the bill and left, getting to the inn being top priority.

~general PoV:

The teleport gate on the 2nd floor showed that somebody was teleporting to this location. When the glow subsided, it revealed a familiar blue-haired man standing on the platform.

Diavel had an annoyed look in his eyes, as he was fairly mad about what Irelia did to him during the boss fight. Intending on ruining her day, he went to search for her.

(Little did he know that he would eventually fall head over heels in love with said girl's best friend.)

 **To be continued.**

 **A/N: Hey there!**

 **No, this story won't ship Diavel and Shino. And please don't flame me because I let him live. I still have a very important role for him in this story and I hope that you can tolerate this abbreviation from canon. Anyways, if you have some questions that need answering, leave a review. If you found a typo/grammar/plot error, leave a PM. If you like the story, feel free to review and follow. For those who wonder what the Sword Skills do, a list is now up. Some Sword Skills are the same whilst others have been changed.**

 **Constructive criticism is always appreciated as is any kind of feedback.**

 **Also a huge thank you to all those who followed my story so far. It is very encouraging to see that my story is actually getting views. And last but not least, thanks for reading.**

 **Ja ne!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**


	4. Interim - Reason for the Whiskers

**A/N: Hey there and welcome back! If you're reading this it means that you have officially reached floor 2 (which is going to be a 2-chapter section) ;) This chapter will be a bit more split-up than the others.**

 **As always, feel free to PM me if you have any questions and leave a review if you found any typing/grammar/plot errors.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

~Maho's and Asuna's PoV, Time skip: 3 days. (December 7th, 2022)

Irelia just un-equipped her **Chronokeeper** and **Mimung** after the boss fight when her sister approached her. "Onee-chan, do you want to go shopping? I am kinda tired out after all this cow-killing."

The duo had formed a party with Kirito and Sinon after they met up near a forest, away from the public, just to hunt down the 2nd floor field boss. Surprisingly, the location where the **Bullbous** **Bow** was located, was the same as in the alpha stage. (In the beta, he was somewhere else.)

A fun fact was that the boss dropped an A-class ingredient that was called **Pristine Giant Cow Steak** , a steak so large that it could really be from the bull-like boss. This encouraged Asuna, who then acquired the **Cooking** skill, using a non-combat skill slot that she acquired with her sister a few days ago.

Although this was great and all, the actual **Last-Attack Bonus** was a rapier that was called the **Épée**. Its name was simple, but the weapon itself… oh my god was it strong. It was bombarded with residual effects, boosting its effective stats up to par to a floor 5 rapier. (Maxed out, the equivalent value reached that of a stock **Mimung**.)

Not needing the blade, Irelia (who got the item by using a rather large combo on the **Chronokeeper** ), simply handed off the blade to Asuna, hoping that she wouldn't mess up and get it broken.

After the fight, the four split up again, Kirito and Sinon continuing to hide, which is where the girls are now. Just left alone on the way back to **Urbus** , grinding their butts off on floor 2.

~General PoV:

Kibaou was mad. Somebody had found the field boss of the 2nd floor and killed it. And much to his dismay, he could see who did it. (But not how.) He saw that Irelia, whom he already had secretly tagged as a Beater, work together with the other two beaters to kill the boss. The little chick Asuna was also there.

Not wanting to throw himself to the wolves by marking them as Beaters (all the players wanted to have evidence of such a thing), he waited for the right moment to do so, hoping that it would be soon.

Needlessly to say, one of the sisters had already planned to become a Beater.

The news of the four players beating up **Bullbous Bow** also reached Diavel, who was more than surprised to hear that. Not even a week into the floor, and the people were already at it. This also made him furious as the girl who he hated the most took part in it.

Eventually, he decided not to care about it and get grinding, in hopes of clearing this floor and getting the revenge he deserved so thoroughly.

~Maho's and Asuna's PoV, Time skip: 2.5hrs

Irelia was despairing. Asuna had taken (or dragged to state it correctly) to shopping as soon as they were done grinding 30 minutes ago, and she was already annoyed by the fact. Among the things she hated most (in-game), was shopping. One could say that she liked shopping in real life, as she did indeed enjoy it once a while, but in-game, she saw it as a useless thing, being stuck in a death game and all.

"Onee-chan, how about this one?" Asuna asked, wearing a white blouse with jeans, wanting to get her sister's opinion on the outfit.

"As I said, it looks decent. Like almost every other outfit in this store." She stated, wanting nothing to do with this accursed waste of free time that Asuna loved so much. (' _like seriously, why waste_ this large _amount of money on something this trivial and useless so early on when we're still poor?_ ')

"Okay, so I am done" Asuna said, earning her a sigh of relief from the black-haired girl. This made Asuna frown, though. "What do you find so bad about shopping?" She inquired, really annoyed about Irelia's distaste of shopping. "I dunno… it just seems useless." Her sister replied, not even trying to reason as her dislike was, honestly, unfounded, apart from the money-wasting part, that is.

Asuna, not wanting to deal with this anymore, just decided to let it be. "Oh well, let's get home. The boss fight is like one week later, so I can still work on cooking~." She said, a teasing tone in her voice, expecting Irelia to run. (The one thing she hated more than shopping was cooking, or so Asuna believed.)

Much to her surprise though, Irelia simply grinned, knowing that Asuna still thought that she ate out every day. The bitter truth was actually the total opposite; she cooked and ate at home every day, making cooking a hobby whilst she had nothing to do.

"Let's go then. The hotel room has a kitchen, so we can cook there." She said, earning her a surprised glance from Asuna. "Onee-chan, didn't you hate cooking?" She asked.

"Oh Asuna, there are so many things you don't know. By the way, I'm going to invite Kirito and Sinon if it's OK with you." "Sure!" With that, they made their way to the hotel, getting ready to cook dinner.

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV:

"Oy, Sinon! Come and see this!" Kazuto shouted to Shino, who was currently showering. After the defeat of the field boss, they split up from the two girls almost immediately.

Before arriving at the hotel, they took a break on the fields somewhere at the foot of the mountain **Urbus** was located in. After that, Sinon went resupplying and Kirito went searching for Argo, attempting to get quest information from her.

One hour later, they'd both arrived at their hotel room, when Shino took a shower, which brings us to where we were after that call from Kazuto.

"OK! Just lemme get dried up real quick!" She said, her voice audible under the stopping water. Roughly two minutes later, she stepped out of the shower. "What's up?" She asked as Kazuto showed her the message he just received a few minutes ago.

" **Hey, Kazuto. You wanna come along for dinner today? Asuna brought up the idea of cooking and I just couldn't resist. ;) Maho** "

Reading this, Shino burst out laughing, astonishing Kazuto in the process.

"Mind telling me what's so funny?" He asked as Shino finally gave in to the laughter and started laughing.

"Oh, it's just that Maho used to hate cooking before she's gone to the states. When she came back, she actually liked cooking. I can only assume that Asuna still didn't know about Maho's newfound hobby." She explained after she caught herself from her laughing fit, causing Kazuto to chuckle and laugh.

"Well, let's hope that Asuna isn't that surprised about it." He said, sounding a bit absent. "What'cha thinkin' 'bout?" Shino asked, clearly seeing that Kazuto was deep in thought.

"Well, I suppose that we can go, but how do we get their whereabouts?" He asked, ignoring the fact that he had the **Tracking** mod for the **Searching** skill installed pretty much instantly after he reached lv50 with it.

And then, Shino facepalmed. Literally facepalmed. After she calmed down, she opened the menu and showed the **Tracking** Skill to Kazuto, whose eyes simply widened.

"*sigh* I guess I was brain-dead, wasn't I?" He asked, sounding really despairing. Shino sighed, knowing that he was like this fairly often. "Yes you are." She stated, whilst thinking: ' _All the time, everytime._ '

In the end, they left their hotel, Kirito activating his **Tracking** skill, only to find that the footprints of the Yuuki sisters were leading back into the Hotel.

"Hey! Whatchya doin'?" Sinon asked, a questioning look on her face as she saw Kirito go back into the inn. "Apparently, Asuna and Irelia are located in this hotel, too." He said, the frown on his face quickly replaced by a smirk as Sinon's mouth formed a perfectly round 'O' shape.

*SMACK*

"What are you gawking at, Kirito?" Sinon asked, blissfully oblivious of the face she made a few seconds ago whilst her lips showed the frown she always wore when she was bored or annoyed. Or mad, for that matter.

"I'm not gawking… I… just… saw your face and thought that it was adorable and all…" He said, that endlessly teasing never leaving his face whilst Sinon smacked him again.

"Ow! What was that for?" He asked, that previously mentioned grin fading into a pained expression.

"That, my friend, was for you telling me that I'm adorable…" She said, not having actually thought about her exact reasoning for hitting Kirito.

"… Whatever… let's just go." He said, still in a pained expression.

~Time skip: 1 hour 30 minutes

"Dinner's ready!" Maho sounded, clearly excited about her first completely self-made virtual meal.

After setting the table, the friends sat down to enjoy the classical American steak & mashed potatoes Maho whipped together. Still being new to cooking, the sisters didn't expect anything to work as planned. Of course, Asuna was surprised to see that her sister _actually could_ cook. After pestering Maho with questions, which she, for the record, answered with curt or straight up one-word sentences, she gave in and told her sister that bit of her time in the US.

Cooking was successful, though and the steak at least looked very delicious. "Wow, Maho… didn't expect you being so good at cooking…" Kazuto mused, earning him a very loud smack from Maho.

' _Why does everybody here physically abuse me?_ ' He thought, rubbing his head in the process.

"Just… Don't…" She said, annoyance clear in her tone whilst mentioning to Asuna, telling her to elaborate.

"Well, onee-chan was living alone in the US and-" She began, before she got interrupted by Kazuto. "I know the story… but still…" He said, not knowing what to say.

"Oh well, let's just start eating" Maho said. ' _I certainly don't wanna deal with that again…_ '

And with that, the four teens dug in. The meal was delicious, the Meat tender and the mashed potatoes really smooth. (A/N: I actually want to say that there are no chunks in there but whatever) This great result encouraged the sisters to continue their hobby, improving the needed skill in the process.

Within half an hour, they were finished with eating and discussing the 2nd floor boss. Eventually, they (or rather, Kazuto) noticed a familiar hooded figure getting cornered by a few black-clad players.

"Guys, that's Argo getting cornered there!" The brunet said, resulting in the whole group rushing out of the room.

~Argo's PoV (3rd person)

Meanwhile, the infamous rodent was getting cornered and forced into an alleyway by the players. "Awwwww come on! You'd sell ANYTHING! You said so yourself!" one of them shouted, clearly annoyed of Argo's unwillingness to sell them their desired information.

Suddenly, a hooded girl jumped in front of Argo and a duel request popped up in the Aggressor's menu. "Whaaaa…?" He said, clearly fazed by the girl's sudden appearance.

"Well… she doesn't wanna sell you the info so I suggest you to get away from her before I beat you into a pulp in the safe zone." She said, the coldness clear in her voice.

' _Wait, I know this voice… if this isn't the little 'relia… damn she can be cold…_ ' Argo thought, surprised by the female's iciness.

Every single one of the faces of the four men that were corning Argo was now scowling, fairly mad that a girl approximately 10 or 15 years younger than them dared to challenge them.

"Well, how about a one versus one, right now? If you win, we'll let her be and never ask her for any information again… If I win she gives me the info for free." He said, clearly not scared of the **Mimung** Irelia was now holding.

"Well, why not. I'll fight every single one of you." She said, a little grin forming on her facial features as the man accepted the duel request and the one minute countdown started.

Once the timer reached zero, both players dashed forwards, blades clashing in the middle of the alleyway they were located in.

Amazement crossed the man's features as he saw that his two-handed broadsword was easily stopped by the nimble little rapier of a weak looking girl, whilst a cheeky smirk crossed his opponent's features as she got out of the bladelock and sidestepped.

Now that the man's broadsword had no opposing force to stop it, it continued down the path it was originally headed, the only difference being that the target had long since moved out of danger's way.

Because the man's balance was already off from the heavy weight of his blade, he tumbled after he executed the strike as there was no body to stop the blade of his.

Irelia, being the person that she was, of course relentlessly took advantage of this. Considering the strong damage output of her **Mimung** , one simple **Linear** would be enough to bring his HP to well below 50% winning her the duel in the process.

Doing just that, she stabbed forward, hitting the tumbling man square in the back, bringing his HP to 30% and shattering his armor in the process of doing so.

"If you wanna fight someone, at least fight someone you could actually have the slimmest chances of beating, because this is ridiculous." She said, walking away after grabbing Argo's arm.

As Irelia walked out of the alleyway, she encountered Kirito and Sinon. "What happened?" The latter asked with a wondering glance to Irelia's equipped weapon and her stance, still holding Argo's arm.

"Well, go and find out... if you wish." The hooded girl said, continuing to walk, dragging Argo along.

"Wait… where are we going, 'relia?" The rodent asked, earning her a caring glance from the older girl's emerald-colored eyes.

"I'm dropping you home." She said, sighing afterwards. ' _At least she's back to using that friendly tone of hers._ ' Argo thought, still a bit shocked of the coldness Irelia could emit when her emotions got even in the remote range of negative ones.

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV:

After Irelia walked away with Argo, or rather the former pulling the latter player along, Kirito and Sinon were dwelling in their thoughts. One moment, they were intending to get Argo out of her predicament. The next, Irelia was gone. And then, the girl showed up with Argo a few moments later.

'What was going on in there?' Was the thing the both thought when they stepped into the Alleyway, only to find a man, on all fours, crying.

"What's happened?" Sinon asked, concern totally absent from the voice as she probably knew what had played out here a few moments ago. 'Judging by his HP-bar and armor, Maho didn't go easy on him.' She thought whilst Kirito stepped up next to her.

"*sobs* My Armor! It just broke! And I almost got one-hit KO'd by some hooded girl trying to protect an info-broker." He lamented, the distress still present in his voice.

'So my guess was wrong… Maho DID go easy on him… he's lucky that his sword and life are both still intact.' She told herself, making a mental note to ask her long-time friend about this incident later.

"Well, it was sorta your fault, really." Kirito spoke, surprising Sinon with that statement. "You bullied the info-broker without knowing about her friends." He continued, not noticing his companion's look. "With her level, she could kill you with one **Quadruple Pain**." He finished, gesturing to Sinon for them to leave, which they did.

After they walked for a while, Sinon decided to break the ice and start a conversation. "What was that?" She asked, enticing a shrug from Kirito. "I mean she simply disappeared. Then, when she shows up, she's already saved Argo and almost one-shot a guy." She mused, still with that thoughtful look on her face.

"Honestly, I think that she made the right call." He said, thinking about the brunette's actions whilst walking and talking with his blue-haired friend.

After this, the ever-present veil of silence came down onto the pair again. Not thinking more about it, Sinon accidentally spoke up. "Damn… if I only knew what has gotten into Maho recently…" She mused, her voice bearing a thoughtful note.

"Nobody knows, Sinon." Kirito said, getting a blush from the girl.

*SMACK*

"OW! Damnit what was that for again…?" Kirito asked, still clutching his head. "Well, I guess that, since you got me to blush, I should smack you… like I always do…" Sinon said, sounding really sweet… too sweet. "Are you a tsundere or something?" Kirito asked, holding up his arms in defense when he saw Sinon's pout.

"No…" She finally said, not really knowing what to say in situation. "I guess that I simply get agitated if people see me blush." She concluded and Kirito nodded.

~Diavel's PoV (1st person)

I just saw those two beaters walking along, hushingly chit-chatting about something regarding Argo. ' _Damn, that blue-haired gal is gorgeous…_ ' Was the only thing I thought as she smacked her companion.

Eventually, I decided that she was OK in spite of her being a friend of that other disgusting girl of their group. (The one that hid her disgusting face behind that smug little coat of hers.)

Eventually, Kibaou came up behind me. "Are you alright?" He asked, probably taking notice of my semi-dreamy expression.

"I'm alright." I assured him before turning away again, staring at their last location. "Let's go scouting for the boss…" I said, starting to walk towards the town gate whilst assembling my party.

' _Not this time, little girl. Not this time. If you plan on stealing my glory again, you will pay the price._ '

~Kazuto's PoV (1st person), time skip: 2 days. (December 9th, 2022)

"Finally!" I heard a voice shout, pulling me back into the lands of the waking, so to say.

After Maho saved the rat, she showed us the Origin of her 'Whiskers'. It was a quest for the **Martial Arts** extra skill… which proves to be the bane of our good looks, I suppose.

After accepting the quest, he painted whiskers across our cheeks, telling us that they wouldn't go off unless one completed the quest. (Which is simple – crack a big ol' boulder with one's bare fists.)

Argo had apparently accepted the quest and abandoned it, resulting in her keeping the whiskers for good, after which the whiskers became her trademark during the beta-test. In the release version of the game, she painted them back on with makeup, wanting to keep up her rodent nickname.

And then, I was greeted with a really beautiful sight. Maho was sitting on Shino's lap, hugging her after mumbling something I couldn't hear.

After she apparently remembered what she was doing, she blushed heavily. (Thinking back, I think that it's the deepest red I had seen her cheeks in so far.)

"Sup?" I asked, not noticing the smirk that had formed up on my lips before Maho walked over and smacked me on my head.

"Ow! What was that for?" I asked, confused about her actions. (She was still blushing deep red.)

"That was for your stupid little smirk." She said, after which Shino came up to me and smacked me as well. Less painful but still.

"That too." She said, the blush also visible on her face. "Ok…" I started. "I think that smirking with you near me will always result in some kind of pain for me." I concluded, writing confusion on both of their faces.

A few seconds later, a congratulations screen popped up, telling us that we could now equip the Martial Arts skill when we next get a free skill slot.

"I guess that swinging me towards a boulder when I am punching it helps crack it." Shino said, probably aware of the fact that I had the mental image of this in mind; Maho tossing the younger girl in the air and the latter punching the rock with all her might.

"… Oh well. Let's go home. I've had enough isolation for a while." I said, yearning for my soft, soft bed in the inn.

 **To be continued.**

 **A/N: So, I am sorry for the short chapter and long delay but inspiration loss due to family issues and exams just got in the way of this becoming any longer. Of course, the inspiration loss is gone but the exams are still going on and I need to revise hard. Real hard.**

 **If you have some questions that need answering, feel free to leave a review. If you found a typo/grammar/plot error, leave a PM. If you like the story, feel free to review and follow.**

 **Constructive criticism is always appreciated as is any kind of feedback.**

 **Whatever. I hope that you enjoyed this roughly 3k words long chapter of fluffiness without plot whatsoever and look forward to the next.**

 **Enough of me rambling on now! Thanks for reading!**

 **Ja ne!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**


	5. Rondo of a Fragile Blade

**A/N: Hey guys and welcome to a new chapter of SAO: The Spirit Blades. This chapter is going to be the 2** **nd** **floor boss fight and then some. I have taken the liberty of modifying some factors of the boss for those who actually read the light novels or manga. By the way, this chapter is going to be critical to really understand my OC (Maho), so reading the backstory is strongly advised.**

 **Anyways, I apologize for the late update, again, and would really like to say that it's gonna be faster from now on.**

 **But, I can't. University is bothering me and I am currently engrossed in work. Additionally, my hard disk just decided to die on me and I had to rewrite the whole chapter during Christmas. In the end, I'll try to keep up a regular update schedule for next year, but I won't make any promises.**

 **In the end, I hope that you had a pleasant Christmas and happy New Year to everyone who reads this.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **Disclaimer: bla bla yada yada see chp1**

 **AS OF 1ST of FEB 2016, this chapter has been slightly revised in terms of the mechanics and calculations on the boss fight.**

~Maho's PoV (1st person), time skip: 7 days (December 14th, 2022)

I just finished off the last **Wind Wasp** that was lingering around here as a familiar golden hue surrounded me, notifying me that I had just leveled up.

I was, with the level-up, now level 27 (due to me grinding my ass of 22 hours a day). My AGI was at 45 and my STR was at 36. Now, I've acquired the **Martial** **Arts** extra skill. In the end, I've got 7 skills; **Spirit** **Blades:** **Hiten** , **One-handed** **Rapier** , **Battle Healing** , **Sprinting** , **Acrobatics** , **Cooking** and the aforementioned **Martial Arts** extra skill.

Having split up with Asuna a while ago, I learned that grinding was a lot easier when she wasn't around. She'd simply have worried too much about me getting burned out, resulting in me being incautious and dying. (I think that she still doesn't understand that mental fatigue was the only thing plaguing you if you overexert yourself in SAO.)

Also, after finally getting my whiskers washed off, I smacked the rat on the head for the fact that she didn't tell us what it was to begin with. (We could've stuck with those ugly as hell whiskers forever…) And yes, I like smacking people every now and then… even my own sister has fallen victim to this habit often enough.

Actually, I was on my way to the boss meeting whilst messaging Kirito and Sinon, telling them to meet me and Asuna there.

~Time skip: 20 mins.

After waiting 5 minutes for the duo to show up, my sister and me decided that we would wait for them at the nearest café and get ourselves some latte macchiato… only to see them around the corner.

"Sup?" I asked, tentatively rising a brow and giving them a questioning look, playing the good old Spanish inquisition.

"Well, we're still early…" Sinon said, an incredibly adorable pout making its way across her face.

"You both know that we tend to arrive at the meeting 30 minutes before it starts don't you? Man, what have you been up to all day?" I asked, getting a smirk on Kirito's and Sinon's faces.

"We went grinding. We're both like level 23 now." He said, obviously thinking that he'd out-leveled me.

"Level 27." Was the only thing I said before their smirks turned into surprised expressions. "How?" They similarly asked, earning them one of my more exasperated glances.

"I went grinding 22 hours a day, sleeping and eating in between." I said, putting them in an even deeper state of shock.

"How does one do that?" Sinon asked, clearly surprised that I had grinded for such a long time.

"Well… if you plan on revealing your skills to the world in the boss fight, you want to be as strong as remotely possible." I replied, a calm grin on my face as I saw both of them smile as well.

After that, we went through our respective stats. Kirito and Sinon were both level 25, Kirito having spent 42 points in STR and 33 into AGI. Sinon did the opposite, basing her attacks on speed rather than strength.

In the end, they both also had 7 skills; Kirito had the **One-Handed** **Sword** , **First Aid** , **Searching** , **Battle Healing** , **Parry** , **Fishing** and **Martial Arts** skills, whilst Sinon had the **Blade Throwing** , **One-Handed Dagger** , **First** **Aid** , **Hiding** , **Searching** , **Acrobatics** and the **Martial Arts** skills.

To my surprise, Asuna actually out-leveled Kirito and Sinon. She was level 26, having 45 points in AGI and 33 in STR. Her 6 skills were composed of **One-Handed Rapier** , **Parry** , **First Aid** , **Hiding** , **Acrobatics** and **Cooking**.

20 minutes of discussing later, we came to the conclusion that we could probably kill the boss with only us four, assuming that the boss hasn't changed from the beta. (Due to their recounting and my memories matching, the boss was the same as in the alpha.)

In the end, the meeting started 5 minutes earlier than expected, which is when I noticed a certain blue-haired somebody standing there and being all cheery and happy and stuff. Until he saw me, at least.

' _Why have I saved him in the first place?_ '

~Diavel's PoV (1st person)

I arrived at the marketplace for the boss meeting Lind and I have called in as I saw a familiar face, making mine concoct into an angry scowl. Reminding myself of her actions, I come to the conclusion that I can't exclude her from the party, should she choose to participate in the boss fight.

' _Well, better approach them and see their results before kicking them out the raid party and regretting it._ ' Was what went on in my head as I approached them, face in a diplomatic neutral as I am aware that those four could probably take the boss by themselves, if their levels were high enough.

"Whoa, calm down, feisty pants. I'm just givin' you a heads up for the boss fight, with you being beta-testers and all that." I said as I saw Irelia's face turn into a frown right as I approached them.

"I think that we know enough about the boss already." She said as the two beaters nodded. "However, we wish to see how their reputation holds up in public." Was what she said as she gestured to the guy and the blue-haired girl.

"Ok. So I'll just leave you be for now, or what?" I asked, masking my intention of getting their stats. (They were smart and hid their stats from the public.)

"Yeah. By the way, I'll message you our stats for the raid. We don't want you getting our party to be in a wrong position." She said as she waved up her menu, typing away at the message screen and ending the conversation.

As I left them, Lind approached me. "Diavel, you got their stats?" He asked whilst the sound of a PM came up.

"I've got them." I replied, a confident smile on my face as I opened the PM which contained all the stats of those four players.

" **Irelia: Level: 22, AGI: 35, STR: 31.  
Kirito: Level: 21, AGI: 28, STR: 35.  
Sinon: Level: 21, AGI: 35, STR: 28.  
Asuna: Level: 22, AGI: 41, STR: 25.**"

"Damn impressive levels they've got…" Lind mumbled. "This is at least 3 levels higher than the rest of the party."

"Yeah, I suppose that they're very important assets to the team right now." I said as I turned my attention to the large group again, relaying the location and attack patterns of the boss to the raid party.

~Maho's, Kirito's, Asuna's and Sinon's PoV:

"Onee-chan, are you sure that it's ok to give them our stats?" Asuna asked, clearly uncomfortable with Diavel having their stats.

"Oh don't worry, Asuna, I'm giving them false stats." Maho replied. ' _Though the stats are tuned down a little, they are still impressive… let's just see how that'll turn out._ '

"Well, I trust Irelia's judgement." Sinon said, albeit with a tone that betrayed the fact that she was also not comfortable with Diavel having their stats.

"They're toned down anyways! Just cut it out, ok? It's like real annoying if you're trying to act inconspicuously and having so many people question you there and then." Maho snapped, the annoyance dripping from the tone she used.

"Damn, she's right… We have to give them our stats if we want to join in on this raid. If we don't, we'll just be turned away because of our beater status." Kirito joined in, adding his argument into the mix.

"Whatever. What is done is done. Just deal with it." Maho said. ' _And if you don't, it ain't gonna be my problem now or ever._ '

"Oh well. Let's just get this meeting behind us." Kirito said, exasperated as he was dealing with all this stuff. 'Great. Asuna's just acting up on this whole shit.' He thought, rolling his eyes.

Half an hour later, they already left the boss meeting 25 minutes ago. (They've simply got the location of the boss room and got the time for the raid from Diavel, so there was no real reason for them to stay.)

Asuna was staying with her sister, on the way to the hotel to get some dinner madem, whilst Kirito and Sinon went off to do some grinding. (They weren't exactly pleased as they heard that Asuna was still a level higher than them after all.)

"You serious about that?" Asuna asked Irelia, wondering about the gossip that was sure to come with the beaters leaving the boss meeting so early.

"Oh don't worry, Asuna, It isn't gonna be that bad as you think. The people, although not benevolent, wouldn't turn down a helping hand. That's simply how they work." The older sibling explained, not really interested in the fact that gossip is going around already.

"Oh, no I wasn't talking about that…" Asuna said. "I was talking about their already risky rep." She concluded, earning her a surprised glance from Maho.

"If that's what you mean, don't worry. They'll have a new player to dump their jealousy on soon enough. And to be honest, I couldn't give more of a shit about that as I would on other online games." Maho said, also considering this point of Asuna's not very worrisome.

' _Well, all the hate that I got in the US certainly proves that point…_ ' She silently mused, reminding herself of the ragequitting opponents she faced in several different, long session, online games.

"I guess…" Asuna said, clinging herself to her sister's arm. "But for god's sake, be safe. I can't risk losing you. I wouldn't know what to do without you." Her tone was scared, distressed even.

A pang of guilt overcame Maho as she heard her sister talking. ' _I've neglected my little sister half my life already. Dying on her would probably break her… more than she already is… and irreparably so…_ ' She thought, reminding herself of the joy she found her sibling to be in when she was present, and the sorrow Asuna endured when she found out that Maho was going to the US for 3 years.

All of that encouraged her to wrap the chestnut-haired girl into an embrace. "Shhhhh… it's going to be alright. I am not going to die. Not in this game, not back in the real world, and not anytime soon." She soothed, her voice cracking as she said so.

"Sorry… for cutting you out of the latter half of my life… I promise that, now that I am back, I won't shut you out." Maho continued, trying to apologize for her actions.

"It's ok." Asuna replied, tears in her eyes. "It's because of mom… I know… there's nothing to apologize for. After all, I was allowed to pursue my own desires thanks to you."

After that, Asuna wound herself out of the hug and started walking, Irelia being quick to follow. The rest of the walk was spent in amiable silence, neither one of the sisters wanting (or needing) to talk. It almost seems like Maho has finally broken the imaginary wall that has grown between them in the past few years.

~Time skip: 2 hours.

The sisters were sitting at the dinner table, having cooked up (and eaten) some ramen using the utensils they got from the market whilst heading home. The veil of silence had just settled on the room as Asuna decided to break it again.

"Neh, onee-chan, how did you convince mom to let me do my thing?" She asked, finally wanting some answers Maho had withheld up until now.

"I don't know, actually. I think it was the day I got a stipendium to the MIT Massachusetts three years ago. As you know, I skipped like 6 grades and I had yet to not ace a single exam. Then, they offered me a complete stipendium for attending their school and taking an IT major, with rates so high that it made working obsolete whilst living independently and comfortably." She recounted, deciding to start at the very beginning.

"In the end, I refused the proposal because I wanted to stay here and rest for a while. Skipping 6 years of school took its toll in form of learning. Although I probably learned less than an average student, I was a lot younger and my scores were a lot better than the average. So, I started playing computer games because I sucked at pretty much everything else extracurricular, with the exception of fencing." She continued, still being as detailed as ever.

"One day after making up my mind about MIT, mother approached me. She told me that if I went to the states, she'd grant me three wishes. One for every year that I am to spend away from japan. The wishes could've been everything, and as long as it was reasonable, she would fulfill that wish without questioning or complaining. I could've gotten myself a car, for example. Simple as that." Irelia said, her voice not as stable or composed as she'd have liked.

' _So that's why mom told me that onee-chan has given done everything she could for me… she's_ literally _wished for my happiness._ ' Asuna thought, eyes filling with unshed tears of happiness.

"Naturally, I accepted the offer after I saw you crying over your future, as you didn't want to study… what was it again… chemistry…? The thought of you being so sad made me equally sad, which is the reason why I can't bear you being so sad. That eventually led into me wishing for your freedom, per say… Although it wasn't literally your freedom. It rather can be described as allowing you to take your life in your own hands." She concluded, earning her a neck-breaking embrace from the other.

"Thank you… So much…" Asuna croaked out, sobbing between the words. Only now had she realized that her sister had left japan for her. Or rather, for her _happiness_. ' _She isolated herself from the world just so that I could be happy…_ '

In the end, after continuing Maho's story, (Which entailed her time in the US, which is another story for another time,) the siblings decided that it was time to go and get ready for bed.

After taking a shower, the green-eyed girl found two familiar somebodies in the living room of the inn they were living in.

"EEEEEK!" She screamed, resulting in Kirito, Asuna and Sinon jumping up and looking at her, shocked expressions on all their faces.

"Onee-chan, aren't you supposed to be in PJ's?" Asuna tentatively asked, surprised that her sister was standing there in bra and panties. "Asuna, you know as well as I do that my habits of sleeping haven't changed one bit these years." Her sister said, annoyance in her voice as she equipped a bathrobe.

"WHAT? You sleep in underwear?" Sinon questioned, trying to deal with the fact that her longest-time friend shared the same sleeping habits as herself. ' _Damn… I never could've imagined that that was one of the reasons she preferred separate rooms during the month we spent together…_ '

"Well, that's a sight to behold. The great Maho Yuuki is sleeping in underwear!" Kirito exclaimed, after which his face instantly got more fearful from the looks the girls were sending him. "Damn…" was all he muttered before the girls gave him a beating.

Although the aforementioned beating was short, it was quite painful indeed. After the three girls were finished, Maho decided to introduce Kirito and Sinon to Asuna for real.

"Asuna, this is Asada Shino. To be frank, I believe that you've already heard quite a bit about her from me or mom, so I'm not surprised if you told me that you knew her already. And that other guy is Kirigaya Kazuto. Although I don't know him as well as Shino, he's still got a kind heart, which is the reason we became friends." Maho said, earning her a surprised glance from Asuna.

"Now that she knows our names, I suppose that there is no reason for us not to know hers… right?" Shino asked, before thinking her words over again. "…Although I suppose that we already know…"

"Yep, you sure do!" Asuna chimed, certainly happy about the outcome of this as the people who she previously considered as allies were now her _friends_. "Nice to meet you, Shino-chan, Kazuto-kun."

"Oh yeah. Remember to call us by our in-game names if we're in public. It wouldn't do us any good to find other people knowing about our real-life relationships at the moment." Maho reminded Asuna, figuring that she didn't know this rule of online gaming. "OK, will do." Was all her sister said about that subject for the rest of the evening.

Eventually, Shino and Kazuto left for their own room and the four players fell asleep, only to be awoken by a PM to all of them at 7:30 AM the next day.

" **Greetings, Players.  
A new patch has arrived for Sword Art Online. It contains some of the content that was still WIP during the beta-stage.  
Here is the exact change log to the version (release).  
*Player-bound quest series: These extremely hard quests often give a unique player-bound item as reward! Be aware that only ONE PLAYER can accept the quest at the time. (And its continuation quests of the series.) If the player dies while the quest series is still active, the quest series will reset and any player-bound items acquired will reset until somebody else claims them by completing the quests required.  
**Once the quest series is complete, it will be marked complete until the person to do so dies. (When that happens, the quest also resets, becoming available for the next player. Exception are the 5 UNIQUE quest series.)  
**At the moment, there are 1250 common quest series (medium), 600 uncommon quest series (hard), 100 rare quest series (very hard), 45 ultra-rare quest series (extreme), and 5 UNIQUE quest series (?).  
**Be aware that the rarity of the quest + 2 (with enhanced stats) is the rarity of the reward. (For example, a common quest will have a rare weapon as reward for all stages of the quest. Exception: ultra-rare quests still have a legendary class weapon as reward. UNIQUE quests will require the reward weapon as tribute to start the next stage of the quest. The reward items will be unique weapons and are also player-bound, perishing when the player dies.)  
**be aware that the UNIQUE class quests can only be taken ONCE. If the player dies whilst attempting to complete the quest (or the continuation quests of one of the applying series), the quest will remain dormant, never to be taken again.  
*Custom Weapons: With this, an essentially infinite amount of weapons have been just introduced to the world of SAO. The system will now randomly generate the exterior, stats and effects of the weapon drops, depending on the rarity (and location) of said drop.  
*Boss characteristics have been changed:  
**Boss weapon breaking: The boss' combat characteristics have been made more realistic as their weapons and armor can now be broken (and have durability), resulting in a bonus material drop for the breaker of the weapon at the end of the battle. Bosses are also not immune to debuffs anymore. (They suffer a reduced effect, depending on the applied de-buff.)  
**Boss hate: bosses will now build up hate towards players that attack it, preferring to damage them if the opportunity presents itself.  
*Some improvements to the taste reproduction engine.  
*Improvements to crystals:  
**Healing crystal, Teleport Crystal, Antidote Crystal: cost down  
**Corridor Crystal: duration up, rarity up.  
**Message Record Crystal, Record Crystal, Screen-Shot Camera Crystal: quality improved, cost down, several bugs removed and rarity down.  
*Changes to items: (A/N: I am only writing the relevant ones.)  
**Mimung: DMG down by 10, (110 – 100), Crit up by 5% (20 % – 25%) Residual effects: Durability shred, Pointed, Quick Rest, Crit Up, ADDED: Scavenger, Unbreakable.  
**** **Épée:** **DMG down by 5 (45 – 40) Crit down by 5% (22.5% – 17.5%), Residual effects: Pointed, Quick rest, ADDED: Fast Charge, Crit Up.  
**Ebony Wing: DMG up by 5 (20 – 25), Crit up by 5% (15% – 20%), Cost up by 1000 (1500 – 2500).  
**Anneal Blade: DMG down by 5 (20 – 15).  
The next patch will arrive somewhere around Christmas, entailing new quest series and other updates!**"

"Wow…" Shino muttered, having just read the extensive patch notes, noting the similar reactions from Kazuto.

"Let's meet up with the others." He said, still revising the patch notes in his mind. ' _Damn, my_ _ **Anneal Blade**_ _has been hit quite hard... I've got to be even more careful in the future._ '

And with that, they were off to find Maho and Asuna, who are currently also reading the patch notes.

"The raid is at 10:00, right?" Asuna asked her sister. "Yeah, so we have two and a half hours left." She replied, sounding not at all pleased because of 'not sleeping enough'. (Actually, Maho's just mad because she wasn't allowed to sleep through.)

"*squeal* Great! I still have enough time to get my rapier upgraded!" The younger girl said, voice full of excitement. And with that, they made their way to the blacksmith.]

~Time skip: 30 mins

"Hey Asuna! Irelia!" Kirito shouted, walking over to them. "Sup?" "You ready for the boss fight?" Kirito asked.

Not at all fazed about the sudden appearance of her friend, Irelia simply replied, giving them the status of their equipment: "Yea, we have 15 healing crystals, 2 teleport crystals, an antidote crystal and a bunch of pots each. The weapons are all ready and upgraded as is the armor." ' _And Asuna hasn't let me continue to sleep because of that._ ' She added silently.

"Well, if that's so… can I convince you two to get some breakfast with me and Kirito?" Sinon piped up, thinking that a breakfast with the Yuuki sisters might be just right to lighten the mood before a boss fight. (With the right amount of teasing, of course.)

"Sure! I'll just get this wrapped up real quick." Irelia agreed, knowing that Sinon will possibly (and probably) tease the shit out of her if she gave her any opening at all. ' _I'll simply not give her the opportunity… and get Asuna back for waking me that early…_ '

After that thought, an evil smirk appeared on Irelia's face, causing Sinon to frown in turn. Whomever Irelia smirked like that to, Sinon knew, was in for either a very good prank or a very harsh punishment. "So, Sinon, about my little sis…" And then, she jokingly threatened to tease Sinon if the younger girl didn't tease Asuna during breakfast.

~Time skip: 1hr 30 mins.

Breakfast has been a quick thing, always has been for the four players, who had cheesecake, (Which, according to Asuna, doesn't taste like cheesecake.) French toast, tea and coffee. Of course, Sinon didn't want to get teased, so she teased Asuna like there was no tomorrow, which resulted in a very upset Asuna.

Eventually, after they left the café behind, they made their way to the boss chamber, which was conveniently located in a dungeon near **Urbus**. A few miles to the north and one arrived at said dungeon.

Now, they were walking through the dungeon, working towards the boss room for 5 minutes.

"Neh, Kirito-kun, how do you think we should approach the boss?" Asuna asked, still not knowing the detailed information about it as Kirito only covered the general specs of the boss.

Instead of the expected boy answering her question, it was her sister who proposed the fighting plan. I've recently unlocked the **Lightning Revolver** skill on my **Chronokeeper**. With my current stats, it should deal, when fully stacked, enough damage to take out two of the boss' HP bars if we assume that the pre-nerf **Anneal Blade** +7 needed roughly 80 (1200 / {[20 + 7*2.5] * 40%} = 80) or 90 hits to deplete one of the four HP bars. It can be positioned straight at its weakpoint and strike without me taking damage, because he flinches when hit there."

"So you are saying that you are willing to put your life in danger to fight the boss?" Asuna asked. "I know that your blades reduce your defensive stats."

"It's ok, Asuna, as long as I hit the boss with the first strike, he'll continue to flinch with each strike I deliver, rendering him unable to move during that duration." Irelia reasoned, trying to convince Asuna (and herself) that this wasn't as dangerous as it actually is.

"Also, consider the options. Either we deal with the boss using true damage, damage amplification due to a weakspot, two damage up perks and a permaflinch, OR we deal with it the old fashioned way… The boss has 1200 HP in each HP bar. With my current level, it would take roughly 30 hits using the Mimung to get his HP bar down by one, of which he has 4. (1200 / [100*40%] = 30, boss having **Thick Insulation** negates **Pointed** and 60% damage is reduced due to very high armor values, assuming that we can't get to the weakspot.) OR, we could use the **Chronokeeper** , which does 100 true damage on hit (50*2 due to **Attack** **Boost** , **Pointed** and the weakspot.) and finish him using my new up-to 24-hit combo in 5 minutes." She reasoned, putting her choices in a more clear light.

"I guess that this makes sense. But please… be careful." Asuna gave in, sounding even more anxious than before.

Seeing this, Irelia decided to hug her sister. "Hey… it's gonna be ok. I already told you that I wouldn't die on you. Not now, not tomorrow, not in this life. I won't leave you like that again."

After that conversation, the group continued on in the dungeons until reaching the boss room, where they waited for the raid party to show up. During that time, they had a conversation about revealing Irelia's unique skill.

"So… Onee-chan, how do you think they'll react when they see your unique skill?" Asuna asked, concern lacing her young voice. "Well, they'll be jealous. And upset because it is apparently so 'OP' as you would call it." Irelia reasoned, sounding completely aware of the third fact that was looming upon them; the fact that she might be accused to be Kayaba's henchman. Or henchwoman. Or whatever.

'If that comes true, I'll simply go solo or with the other two.' Irelia reasoned, seemingly completely oblivious about the people's willingness to kill.

As if Asuna could read her sister's thoughts, she came up with a quote from Thomas Hobbes. "Remember. Homo homini lupus. The man is a wolf for his fellow men, meaning that the people won't hesitate to kill you if it means for them to get some sort of benefit out of it."

"You're right, though. I'll simply get to that when the time comes. Just don't hate me for this." The older girl said, not wanting to think about the worst possible outcome. "Besides, people already know that there is a unique skill user around, don't they?"

That's when Kirito decided to join the conversation. "For the beta-testers that's true. Also, Kayaba said that there was a second unique skill already en route for somebody. The nature of it, according to him, would be released within a week after clearing floor 9."

After discussing the possible natures of the second unique skill, they seemed to stray off subject. Going from archery to Sinon's skills with ranged weapons to something entailing fish in SAO and then to the sleep system. Once a conversation swayed, it was difficult to get it back on track.

Finally, they reached the place, after 8 more changes of subject, and waited for the raid party to show up. When they finally did 15 minutes later, their faces all sported annoyed frowns or angry scowls. "So where were these four hiding at during the meeting?" One guy asked, peeved that somebody had gotten here before him.

"Quit it. I'm here to kick some Taurus king's butt and not get flamed by mad players." Irelia said, effectively revealing that she knew that boss inside the room.

"Okay, okay, calm down, Joan." A calm voice interjected, stopping Joan from further harassing the few players. "They are like 4 to 5 levels higher than us and thus are the most valuable asset to the party at the moment. You better be respectful toward them." Lind said, walking towards the party.

Turning his attention to them, he said: "Sorry 'bout that. Joan is very… impulsive sometimes." "Apology accepted. To be honest, I could honestly not care much less about how the people act towards me whilst I am online." Irelia said, her tone demanding superiority without sounding toxic. Her tone betrayed also the fact that she would cut down anybody threatening her (except for Asuna, Sinon and maybe Kirito) without hesitation, which caused the players, including her party, to flinch.

"Let's get this boss done, why don't we?" Diavel interrupted, exasperation clear in his voice and eyes. "So, Kirito, Sinon, Asuna, Irelia, you four are the main damage party of this raid. The tanks will try and tank the damage and disables while you recharge. Rinse, repeat, victory." He explained, thinking that his plan was truly majestic.

"Well, I have a better plan. But first, look at this." She said, getting her **Chronokeeper** out of her inventory.

The whole raid party erupted into gasps of shock and surprise at the sight of this four-bladed weapon. When the initial surprise died down, Diavel spoke up, hostility in his voice. "What is this about, Irelia?"

This sentence just made Irelia sigh in exasperation. Instead of directly replying, she countered with a question instead. "Seriously, Diavel? I thought you knew about the unique skill that was distributed in the alpha stage, as Kayaba announced it in the beta too. Or are you too stubborn to acknowledge that fact?"

"So you are telling me that _you_ out of all people has won the unique skill?" He asked, disgust accompanying his unspoken declaration that he deserved it. "Yes."

Irelia's reply just made him scowl even more than the hidden fact that she was indeed, according to Kayaba Akihiko, a better player than him. (He himself stated that almost every alpha tester was _very_ skilled.)

Eventually, Sinon decided that this was enough and cut in. "Now if you'll both stop this senseless dispute, we've got a boss to kill." She also said to Irelia that she still had a plan to explain.

"Thanks, Sinon. My plan was to use the newest skill I've acquired, **Lightning Revolver** , to essentially one-shot the boss. If I can fully charge it and hit the correct location, it'll be enough to take half the HP off the boss. It ignores armor values, after all."

After Irelia was finished, everyone was stunned. Stunned by the fact that somebody had already gotten a unique skill and could essentially two-shot the floor boss.

Eventually, Diavel regained his composure. Thinking to preserve the little respect he had left, he formed a battle plan around Irelia. "So, you're expecting us to tank for you whilst you charge up the sword skill of yours, correct?" After confirmation from said girl, he continued the questioning. "How long will it take?"

Deciding to further elaborate, Maho simply explained the mechanic of the skill to the party. "So, it'll take 5 minutes to fully charge it. When I'm charging, I build up the boss' **Hate**. Keep in mind that with reaching max stacks I'll also maximize the boss' **Hate** towards me, meaning that he'll probably actively go for me. Also, if I get hit whilst channeling, I'll lose all stacks."

This actually threw Diavel off, not realizing that a unique skill could come with drawbacks like that. "So, you're just telling us that this skill is actually weak as hell when not used correctly?" "Yes." "Have you got practice with this skill?" "Yeah, I used it a few times in the alpha, but back then, the **Hate** Mechanic didn't exist."

After brief consideration of his plan, Diavel spoke up. "Okay, I think I know what we'll do. Irelia should hide somewhere secluded whilst channeling, not letting the boss see her. He'll just have the hate but not the player. We'll beat him down whilst she charges. Once the skill is fully charged and the boss only has 50% of his HP left, we'll get him to flinch so that she can hit it right in the weakspot."

And then, the raid party erupted in cheers.

"Let's do this!" Lind called as everybody went into the boss chamber, which was roughly 20m high and wide with 150m in the length department.

At the end of said chamber, a gigantic black Taurus stood, towering ten meters in height. His legs were as thick as tree trunks and his waist was covered in chainmail. Above the waist, his bare muscular chest shone, showing off his black fur. The head, as the name suggests, was the head of a bull, completed with six horns, a crown and raging red eyes. The last detail worth mentioning was that he held a bulky looking gigantic hammer in both his hands.

As soon as Irelia entered the boss chamber, channeling **Lightning Revolver** , she hid behind a pillar, hiding her effectively from both Asterius' sight and his lightning breath.

A minute passed and not much happened. The boss unleashed his **Numbing Detonation** skill several times, but all it did was get the raiders to use their **Antidote Crystals** and **healing potions** before resuming beating him down. The first HP-bar was emptied by 50%.

The second minute passed much less successful as the Boss started to use his lightning breath attacks, getting more enraged the more damage he took. Sometimes, Sinon managed to get the boss to abort the skill, other times it hit a few unfortunate players that weren't fast enough to hide behind a pillar. Ultimately, it, still, did nothing in terms of casualties while the clearers emptied the first HP bar entirely.

The three minutes after that were devastating, though. As Irelia continued to charge up her stacks, the boss' hate became too much. Instead of firing his lightning breath along the chamber, he aimed at random pillars, the AI deducing that the source of **Hate** has to be hiding behind one of those. Luckily for her, she didn't take any damage nor aborted the channel. Also, the boss started to more frequently use his **Numbing Detonation** skill. When the three minutes ended, most of the raid party used up a good half of their healing items and equipment durability, but emptied the second HP bar too, courtesy of Kirito, Sinon and Asuna throwing in their highest level sword skills. This is when Irelia finally stepped out of her cover.

"Sinon, could you hit his crown, please?" She asked. Instead of replying verbally, Sinon simply threw a well-aimed throwing pick at the boss' head, hitting him in his weakspot.

The boss flinched.

Irelia positioned her blades in front of Asterius' head, herself close beneath him, aiming her **Lightning Revolver** to hit the crown. And then, the boss' HP bars disappeared relatively quickly as the blades began their relentless assault. After the **Lightning Revolver** was done, the boss still, surprisingly, had half a HP bar left. It entered rage mode and was, as Irelia would later put it, highly and royally pissed.

He stomped the ground repeatedly, stunning everybody in the chamber for three seconds. Irelia, having used her **Chronokeeper** on penalty range (11m), took quite a lot of damage. The fact that she was close to the epicenter of the impact didn't help either.

After the damage was dealt, Irelia was down to 20% of her max HP, whilst others were barely scratched, albeit also being stunned. In the background, one could hear Asuna's ear-piercing scream of horror.

One second passed.

Irelia watched in horror as Asterius started charging up his Lightning Breath, aiming to eliminate the whole party at once. She got out her first **Antidote Crystal** and a **Lesser Healing Crystal**. In her peripheral vision, she saw Asuna, Kirito and Sinon getting **Antidote Crystals** of their own out, un-stunning themselves.

Another second passed.

Irelia's stun was gone and her HP has recovered to 87%. The only thing she could do was try and hit the Boss' crown one more time to prevent him from wiping out the entire party. She got one of her blades to do so. It hit. Only Kirito and Sinon noticed Asuna's sigh of relief when it did so.

The boss veered back as his weak spot was hit, although no visible damage showed up on his HP bar. Apparently any tiny amount of damage to that crown of his would make him flinch.

And then, Kirito and Asuna were with her, Sinon providing ranged support from behind.

"Irelia, we're going to bring the boss down and buy some time for them to recover and heal up. Asuna will open, I'll switch with her and you'll join in the end. Try to make use of some safer method to damage him this time. I don't think that making such a move again will be wise."

And with that, they sprinted towards the boss. Asuna opened with a **Quadruple Pain** and a Linear, stunning the boss. Unfortunately for her, the boss had the **Tenacious** buff, which halved the one-second stun, enabling him to smack her with his hammer on her way back after the 0.1 second freeze period.

A jolt of fear shot through Irelia as she saw Asuna get knocked back, only to be replaced by a sense of relief shortly after. The boss did do quite some damage, but Asuna held through it, having roughly 65% of her HP left.

Kirito then followed up, starting with a **Rage Spike** and a **Slant**. The boss wasn't stunned, but couldn't strike back due to the fact that his hammer was too bulky to hit Kirito after just having hit Asuna, who attacked from the opposite side.

In the end, it was Irelia's turn. Three well placed throwing picks, thrown expertly by Sinon, hit their marks. One hit the crown, making the boss flinch and stagger. The other two hit its eyes, blinding the boss and making him veer backwards even further.

Irelia, seeing this, immediately jumped up his knee using the **Acrobatics** skill and boosting herself with the **Chronokeeper** , dashing towards his head on his leg. Due to his torso being bent by 45 degrees, she succeeded. Aiming her **Diagonal Hexagon** at the crown, she charged. The sword skill hit home. The boss staggered back even further, falling on its back as result.

"Guys let's finish this!" Agil screamed, charging forwards and bringing his battleaxe down on Asterius' legs. The rest of the raid party quickly followed.

Seeing the boss' HP bar quickly dissipate, Irelia used **Quadruple Pain** on the crown, effectively, and luckily, gaining the **Last-Attack Bonus** off Asterius.

As the Taurus king exploded and the congratulations screen popped up, everybody cheered. After 15 minutes, they opened the door to the third floor.

Eventually, Maho checked her **Last-Attack Bonus** , which was an item called **Coat of Sunset** , a dark blue, ankle-length coat, the color of which faded into a beautiful purple-ish color below the knees, roughly displaying an ocean sunset scene. The defensive stats of the coat were actually also quite good, giving a solid Upon further inspection, she found out that her **Scavenger** attribute on her **Mimung** actually got her a second item. A ring called **Signet of the Cold**. It apparently reduced 5% of the damage taken but converted half of it into durability damage on the ring.

Maho, Shino and Kazuto were sitting in the latter two's hotel room, discussing the outcome of the boss fight. Asuna was split up from the group under the pretense of getting a bit of grinding done on the newly opened floor.

"Maho, you know that I was worried sick when that thing didn't die, don't you?" Sinon asked, the shock about the situation briefly resurfacing.

"Yea, sorry about that, Shino. Apparently Kayaba still buffed the boss." Maho replied, exasperation in her voice once more.

Then, Kirito brought up an entirely other concern of the black-haired girl; Asuna. "I think you should go and talk with Asuna. She was pretty shocked about the boss not dying. Also, I imagine that she'd be pretty mad about you right about now."

And then, Maho looked up. ' _Oh shit I have completely forgotten Asuna. She just didn't mention it and went off…_ ' Deeming it rational to not do more damage by blocking her sibling out, Maho decided to meet Asuna right away.

After she left, Shino and Kazuto looked, needlessly to say, smirking at each other, both thinking the same thing. ' _She's gonna be in so much trouble._ '

 **To Be Continued.**

 **A/N: hey, so you made it! I already said that this chapter will be a long one, didn't I?**

 **If you have some questions that need answering (or like the story), leave a review. It shows me that people still enjoy this story enough to give the author a bit of feedback. If you found a typo/grammar/plot error, leave a PM. If you like the story, feel free to follow or favorite.**

 **AS OF 1ST of FEB 2016, this chapter has been slightly revised** **in terms of the mechanics and calculations on the boss fight** **.**

 **Constructive criticism is always appreciated as is any kind of feedback.**

 **Thanks for reading!**

 **Ja ne!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **EDIT: Adjusted a few skills from the previous chapters, added time-stamps, fixed grammar and spelling. Nothing noteworthy.**


	6. Broken Past, Shattered Present

**A/N: Hey there, it's been almost four months, hasn't it? Well, expect biweekly updates from now on… midterms are over and I've done all my essays and stuff. Also, I was in Houston for one and a half months, rendered unable to write.**

 **Anyways, Enjoy.**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **Warning: slight angst.**

"I'm Sorry about that…"

The voice belonged to Maho, who decided, after reminding herself of her sister's fear of losing her, to apologize to her sister. "I really expected that the boss changes would be included in the patch notes, so it came as kind of a surprise to me when Kayaba added an extra HP bar worth of health to the boss."

After that, Asuna sighed. She couldn't be mad at her sister for long with this – especially because Maho was acting on behalf of the greater good. "I guess you're right, onee-chan… though I still don't, and won't start to, appreciate you – almost – dying on me."

This made the older girl sigh. 'Apparently she's afraid of me going for real. ' "Well, I'll try and be more careful in the future… and try not almost-dying. Can't definitely promise that second one though… Anyways, I think that I missed my point. The point of this is that I want to see a smile on your face, even if I'm absent. Don't be depressed because of my absence, be happy of your opportunities. Because the best –and only – payoff for me is your smile."

With that, Asuna got frustrated. Frustrated at her sister for being cold, selfless and heartless, frustrated at kayaba for getting her in this situation, frustrated at her family for being stuck up. She huffed in annoyance to make space for said frustration. ' _So she wants to see me smile, huh. Her actions did the exact opposite._ '

"Do you think that was ever happy when you were gone from my life? Do you think that I, during these three years you were happily chilling in the states, acquired any happiness? Do you think that I'd be happy if I had success in life in exchange for the only person in the world I feel really attached to? Nee-chan, think about that! Think about how you left me in Japan to sulk whilst you left for the goddamn university in the states! I was fucking depressed. Whenever you return in my life, you seem to, unintentionally but still, hurt me. Heck, you were cold as ice when you got back from the states, shutting me out. You say that you're acting in my best interests, but you're hurting me the most whilst doing so!" She snapped, venting her pent up anger towards her sister.

This reaction of Asuna towards Maho was unexpected for the elder girl, to say the least. She had expected Asuna to simply not snap; Asuna could be mad, angry, annoyed, whatever. But she never spoke without reason. (Which technically also applies to the statement just now, but at the same time doesn't.)

And then, Maho snapped too. She was plain mad. How could Asuna assume that she had a good time in the US when she didn't even know how it was like? How could Asuna assume that she was, after a good three years living in solitude, still the same person? The three years she spent abroad were easily the most painful ones in her short life so far and her sister dare assume that she was happy? Her sister accused her for being cold when she returned from the US, which was true, by the way. But she was scarred. Both psychically and emotionally. Almost three whole years of bullying turns the bullied cold.

Eventually, Maho closed her eyes. And half a minute later she reopens them. The bright shining emerald color has gone cold, much more resembling the coloring of the dark green needles of an evergreen forest tree in the winter, when she spoke up: "Fine, Asuna. If you really think like this, I probably shouldn't bother you anymore. I'll end up hurting you anyways." Her voice was cold as was her demeanor, but a gentle smile graced her lips as she continued, words cutting like a sharpened rapier through a simple layer of cloth. "As always, I'll do what I can to make you happy. I tried to be there for you when you need me… you just told me that it did the exact opposite. So now, I'll do the exact opposite and leave. Hopefully you'll be happy then, as I'm not there to hurt you anymore. And by the way, the three years in the US were easily the worst three years of my life. They left me more scarred than you could even remotely imagine. And then you blame me for shutting down whenever we're talking about it, claiming that I'm shutting you out! Maybe I was, but I was trying to as open as I could be without reopening old wounds and scars. Also, didn't you notice the huge gaps and holes in my storytelling yesterday? Just fill them in for I only told you about roughly 3 months' worth of time there. Fine, Asuna, fine. Teleport; Dessel!"

"WAIT! Nee-chan!"

But it was too late. Maho was gone and Asuna was sitting in her hotel room, alone and devastated. Only then she noticed that she was being an egotistical immature brat about the whole matter.

She was afraid frustrated at basically everything and disregarded the elder sibling's feelings in the whole regard. She did ask her sister about her stay in the states but Maho shut down immediately, transitioning from elaborate descriptions to simple, one worded answers to her questions. It was a miracle that she didn't get the hint about Maho having had a bad time there.

She knew that her sister was trying for all she was worth to be a great elder sibling. But in the heat of the moment, she just forgot. She forgot that her sister meant first and foremost for her wellbeing and happiness, she forgot that her sister has gone to the US for a fifth of her life to give her some resemblance of a choice in life, she forgot that her sister was actually warm and open before she pestered her with questions about the US. (Every time she did such a thing, Maho would simply shut down for a few hours and be back to her old self afterwards.)

It is still a miracle to her how she didn't catch on to her sister's aversion towards talking about the past.

That devastated Asuna. Never had she thought that her sister might be so reclusive because she was scarred, out of all things. But then, reality always had a way to show you that everyone has their secrets somewhere within them. That even the most _polished, accomplished_ people had secrets, wounds and scars like everybody else.

Eventually, she stood up and started mindlessly walking. And 20 minutes later, by fate or chance, she found herself in front of Kirito's and Sinon's room. She knocked.

"Come on in!" A female voice shouted, clearly, or probably, not expecting Asuna to show up, even less expecting the fact that said person was now clouded in a cold state of emotionlessness.

After seeing Asuna, Shino's eyes widened. Not once had she seen somebody so absent or shocked whilst being completely sober and mentally fit. Judging from Asuna's empty eyes, she assumed that the chestnut-haired girl had some kind of trauma.

Deciding that there was no use in beating around the bush, she straight up went to business. "What's up?" She asked.

Out of all possible reactions, this was the one she hasn't expected. Asuna started crying and sobbing uncontrollably, breaking down on the floor whilst she was at it. Seeing this, a very surprised Asada Shino wrapped her arms around Asuna's waist, trying to comfort the distressed girl.

"Hey, what happened? Did someone break your heart? Did someone bully you?" She asked, receiving no response from the other, who has seemingly gone irresponsive.

After 2 minutes, the sobbing died down and Asuna started recovering from her breakdown. Then, she started explaining the situation to Shino. "Maho's gone, Shino-chan. *sob* We had a fight because of her apologizing and I snapped at her for shutting me out and hurting me emotionally whenever she came back into my life. And then, she even stayed calm. She said that, if I was really thinking like this, she won't bother me anymore, not hurting me anymore. She also said that the time in the US was the worst time in her life."

After she finished talking, Asuna continued to sob and cry, pulling herself together into a ball.

This went on for roughly half an hour until Kazuto came back from hunting and resupplying.

"Shino? You there? I've finished what we need. Let's get a move on and resume grinding." He said, clearly displeased about wasting time on trivial matters right now.

"Kazuto-kun, could you help me, real quick? Asuna's here." Came the blue-eyed girl's response, voice silent and soft as silk, although it had an edge about it that entailed something similar to do it or else.

With that, Kazuto sighed in resignation and made his way into the living room. What he saw wasn't what he expected, though. Asuna was sitting on the couch, arms wrapped around her legs and head on her knees. It was apparent that she cried. "Whoa… everything OK?"

After that, Shino explained everything to Kazuto, who had problems processing the whole thing. Never would he have guessed that Maho was so emotionally torn. But then again, he never would've guessed that she could be so damn cold towards others. If that was proven wrong, why couldn't this be proven wrong either?

For Shino, it wasn't really a surprise that Maho was emotionally torn. She knew Maho for 13 years now, knowing all her quirks and habits. If Maho shut down, it generally meant that she really didn't want to talk about the subject. So she figured, after tentatively asking Maho about her time there, that the elder girl had a horrible time.

"Hey, Asuna. It's ok. Siblings argue all the time. Your sister won't blame you for what's happened. Look at me and Sugu for example. Even if we fight, we'll make up for it in a few days' time." He said, trying to comfort the girl, who had been looking up to him with tearful eyes when she heard him talk.

Asuna's feelings were a mess then. But at that time, something in her mind clicked. She came to the conclusion that Maho would take initiative and come to her to clear this whole thing up, as Maho has always been the more reasoning one. In the meantime, she figured, she'd just have to focus on something else.

~Maho's PoV (3rd person), time skip: -22 minutes

Maho arrived in **Dessel** with a completely neutral which didn't show any of her feelings towards the untrained eye. But beneath that, only visible to those who knew her well (i.e. Sinon), she was furious. Sad, angry and melancholic is how she would describe her feelings afterwards.

Sad because of Asuna's reaction brought a flashback from the past to her. It was at the café one day, Maho had done something ridiculous and upset one of her friends. Then, she went to apologize and her 'friend' started mocking her, ridiculing her in public. ("Do you really think I felt any sort of friendship towards you? Damn, you must be really pathetic…")

After that, the bullying started and went on for the remainder of her stay in Massachusetts, which was, at the time, still 34 months long. The most painful 34 months of her life.

Angry because of every single effort she made to make up for her sister was, according to said sister, hurting her. Maho was acting on her best intentions, re-establishing a connection of sorts towards her younger sibling and it was actually not her who cut it off.

Melancholic because of her memories about such situations completely matching up with the ones she finds herself within. She has nobody to hold onto, nobody to comfort her, nobody whom she could open up to. It was like these last three years found their way back to her in form of a death game created by a crazy developer.

All of this led her to one conclusion about her situation. – She was alone. Her family (or who she considered as family) hated her. The wounds she had tried so long to keep closed have been ripped open by her sister. – She would have to store her feelings away. She always did that when she felt this way; alone and hurt. ' _Conceal, don't feel. Don't let them know. One has to be strong to prevail in a world where the weak die. My current feelings would make me weak and vulnerable, so I should conceal them. Feeling them would make the concealment difficult, so I should not feel them._ '

Eventually, she found herself in a diner situated near the central plaza of the city. Ordering herself a drink and getting herself a table, she dwelled in her thoughts, completely detached from the happenings around her. She didn't expect somebody she knew to show up.

"Maho? Maho Yuuki? Is that really you?" A clear, not so high pitched feminine voice asked, tone soft like silk but a few pitches higher than natural due to being surprised. This caused Maho to turn around.

In front of her she stood, in all her glory, Marie. She was probably the reason for Maho being not completely broken. She was the only friend of hers in the US, being similarly gifted in the academic ways (she was only a year older than Maho but at the same degree of education and university) and one of the few university students that didn't take enjoyment in bullying her.

It was when the bullying started to get really severe (like after 2 weeks it started) when Marie noticed Maho. The incredibly young student that she's never seen around before. One day, she walked up to the girl and comforted her after the bullies were gone. After that, she started to look out for Maho by reporting the bullies to the teachers. It also helps that she had a good reputation amongst the professors, who didn't tolerate bullying either.

In the end, Marie was like a light in the darkness for Maho. Whenever she felt down, Marie was there to fix her up again. It didn't work all the time but roughly cut the pain for Maho in half. Up to this day, she believes that she'd quit university if Marie wasn't there.

"Marie?" Maho spoke, voice hoarse and trembling. Then, she stood up and wrapped the older girl in a hug. "*chuckle* It's been what? Six months?" The other asked, not sure of the time as of then.

"Seven. You departed in May and now it's December." Came Maho's reply, along with a smile. "But I've got one question; why are you here? Aren't you supposed to be back in the US?"

The older girl suddenly remembered the reason she came here for; confessing her feelings toward Maho, who had done the same just before she left.

~Flashback

 _A strawberry blonde and a brunette were embracing at the Massachusetts international airport, with the redhead standing slightly taller than the other. They were both wearing casual clothing; the one in a black sweater and the other in a cyan one. They were both wearing sneakers and skinny jeans to finish up the look.  
"Marie, I've got something to tell you." Maho said, her voice wavering._

" _What is it, M?" the elder questioned, "You got a boyfriend you didn't bother to tell me about?" She joked, trying to offer some kind of comfort to her friend by joking._

" _It's not about that…" Maho started, but decided to just get out with it. "Actually it is… Marie, I think I like you… as in like you like you…" She said, unusually nervous. "I wish we could be more than friends, when I get back, that is…"_

 _Marie's cerulean eyes widened like saucers when she heard that Maho actually had more than friendly feelings towards her. She herself hasn't thought much about their relationship at first but quickly realized that it was more complicated than just saying yes or no. She wasn't attracted to either gender and her family is sort of old-fashioned. "Maho, I'm gonna be honest with you and say that I can't give you an answer right now. I think that it's all a bit complicated now, as I am, a bit confused about my sexuality right now. What I am gonna say is that I'll give you my answer as soon as possible. Be it in a week, a month or 3 months."_

 _Maho let out a contented sigh as she parted from the other girl. "At least it's better than a rejection" She chuckled and gave a tentative smile which looked to fake to be true. "Whatever your answer may be, be quick about it."_

 _And with that, Maho left for Japan._

~Flashback end

"I think I've got my answer for you…" Marie began, looking at everything around her but Maho. Then, when she gathered the courage she needed, she met Maho's emerald eyes, still darkened from sadness, and perhaps a little of dread.

"My answer is yes." She said as she pulled the other girl into a tender, chaste kiss. "I think I knew the answer all along… it just took me a while to realize it."

Maho smiled. It was a genuine one; for the first time in a decently long time, she was truly happy. She had someone that she cared deeply about (except for her family, Kazuto and Shino) and someone who cared about her (also except for family and friends).

"How did you realize it?" Maho asked, uncertainty in her voice.

"I think it was after I got a little sad and someone asked me out on a date. At the end, he asked me to be his girlfriend and actually had the audacity to move in for a kiss. But before our lips met, I was reminded of you and thought about your lips on mine…" Marie finished, blushing like crazy.

"Oh… okay then… So, what are we? – Or better – where are we standing?" The brunette asked, unsure of that one.

"We are what you want us to be." The other replied, still grinning.

There was probably no one who could've been prepared for the actions Maho was taking. She pulled Marie in for a hug, startling the other, who settled on wrapping her arms around Maho.

"I guess that we're a couple, then?" Maho asked, still holding the other tight in her embrace.

"Yeah, I guess so… but you still owe me a first date." Marie chuckled, trying to tease the other girl, which got her a playful slap to the face and a kiss right after.

"I guess we could arrange that…" Maho's tone was a lot sadder now that she reminded herself of the situation she was in; she just had an argument with her little sister and she left said sister. Now that the euphoric rush induced by Marie agreeing to be her girlfriend was over, she was a lot more guilt-ridden than before.

"What's going on?" Marie asked, immediately recognizing her girlfriend's discomfort.

"It's my little sister, Asuna. Long story short, she snapped at me for trying to get her the choices in life she wanted and accused me of leaving her to rot when I left to the US. Then I told her that the time in the US was, apart from you, the worst time of my life and left. I didn't want to 'hurt' her more than I did already. And then, you found me here, trying to do the usual thing I do when I'm upset…" Maho explained, sadness ever-present in her gestures and words, although one could sense a hint of anger in her tone.

"Oh…" was all Marie said to that before Maho interrupted her again. "Never mind that, though. I guess that if she wants to clear this whole mess up, she'll come by herself. Till then, I've just got to keep her safe without her knowing it. Soooo… about that date, how about we do it now?"

Pride swelled in Marie's heart. For how broken her girlfriend was, she was still trying to help others, who had potentially deeply hurt her, survive. It was her sister, yes, but it doesn't make it any less of a display of inner strength. This showed in form of a genuine, prideful smile. "Yea, sure. You wanna eat here?"

After they got their dinner orders, they settled down, waiting for their meals to show up.

"Okay, so I've got a few questions to ask you, though. For one, what is your IGN?" The tone immediately going from sad to happy, one could see that Maho was trying to mask her sadness. She always did that when she was (expected to be) happy but sad.

"What? IGN? What on earth is that, M?" Marie asked, bewildered by Maho's gaming vocabulary.

"It's an online term for in-game name, Ree. Surprised you didn't know that…" Came Maho's reply, baffled that Marie wasn't used to her going nerd-mode on her anymore.

"Ohhhh… it'Sakura. I wanted to have something Japanese in my name so I went with that." Marie replied.

The food arrived after Marie's sentence and the two girls ate in silence. Eventually, sometimes after dinner, when they were sitting around and idly chatting, the curiosity got the better of Maho.

"What's your level? And skills or stats?" Maho further inquired, considering the options she had. If Marie was good enough a player, she'd consider taking her on the potentially deadly adventures she planned.

"I think that I'm level 24, with 36 AGI and STR. I've built my skills around high mobility and DPS, having **One-Handed Sword** as my main weapon, **Parry** , **Battle Healing** , **Sprint** , **Hiding** and **Acrobatics** to back this style up." Marie summarized, tone thoughtful as if she hadn't checked her stats in a while. "How 'bout you?"

"I recently turned lv28, getting me 46 AGI and 38 STR. My skills are built around agility and high DPS, with **One-Handed Rapier** being my choice. To back this up, I've got the **Battle Healing** , **Acrobatics** , **Martial Arts** and **Sprinting** to back this up. Also, I've got the **Cooking** skill because reasons." Maho said, omitting the fact that she had one more skill than the girl accompanying her.

After that, and some more chatting, they decided that it be best to get to a hotel for the night. They got a room in a decent inn and hit the bunks after taking showers.

~Time skip: 10 days. (December 24th, 2022)

The field boss of the 4th floor exploded into tiny polygons as two players sheathed their weapons. Checking their spoils, they noticed that they've levelled up 7 times in the last 10 days. Duo-killing the field boss and grinding their backsides off apart from that surely showed its effects.

"Well, that was easier than I thought it would be…" Maho said, causing her redheaded companion to chuckle. "With a unique skill, over-the-top levelling and having some of the best gear in-game as of now, you still think that this would be more difficult than it actually was?"

At that, Maho started laughing. "Yeah, I guess you're right, Ree. Now, let's get this stuff checked out and be done with it."

The two girls haven't participated in neither the 3rd field boss fight nor the 3rd floor boss fight, happening two and four days after the incident respectively. It was mostly because of Maho wanting to cool down a bit more before she started to see her sister again. At the time, Maho was sure that confronting Asuna would end up getting problematic.

Her appearance changed, too. Her hair was now waist-long, mostly cascading down her back with a strand of hair dropping down in front of her, held in place by a golden hairclip. Instead of a hood, she wore the **Coat of Sunset** with a lightweight chestplate underneath. Also, instead of the pants, she wore a dark blue knee-length skirt. She's exchanged the starter shoes with black leather boots too.

Marie's appearance has also changed a lot. She wore the **Coat** **of** **Sunrise** , the counterpart of Maho's coat. It began in a dark-blue color and faded in glorious yellows, oranges and reds. She now also wore a high quality chestplate. Combat boots adorned her feet and she discarded her skirt in favor of pants.

Maho was level 35 with a new skill; **Parry**. Her STR was at 50 and her AGI was at 55. She reworked her **Mimung** into a super rare **Sabre** **Minuit** , a pitch-black rapier with a silver, crescent hilt. Even though it seemed impossible the **Sabre** **Minuit** was a lot stronger than the stock **Mimung**. It apparently hadn't been hit by any nerfs whatsoever. It boasted an effective crit stat of 25% due to a maxed out **Crit** **Up** , a raw attack stat of 110, **Pointed** , **Quick** **Rest** , **Fast** **Charge** and **Scavenger**. It's also got a fairly high durability stat, making it a reliable weapon even in the longest fights.

Marie was now level 31 with 2 new abilities; **Riposte** instead of **Parry** and **Searching**. She placed 46 points in AGI and 47 in STR. Her rare classified **Black** **Steel** **Longsword** , recently acquired from a dungeon, had a raw attack of 55, a crit stat of whopping 30%, **Brute** **Strength** , **Reinforced** and **AGI** **up**. Its durability wasn't bad either.

"Hey, Ree, I've got a mail from a friend. She asked me to meet her for dinner as it is Christmas. Should we go?" Maho asked, unsure whether her girlfriend would want to meet Sinon or not.

"Sure. Let's do that, then. I can't expect to have you all to myself during Christmas, can I?" Marie replied, fully intending on meeting Maho's friends. "We've got to get some Christmas presents, though."

After that, they went ahead to get some Christmas presents for Kirito and Sinon, not having the faintest idea of what to actually get them.

~Shino and Kazuto's PoV, time skip: 5 mins

Shino and Kazuto just finished having lunch, discussing a few things whilst eating. Among those things was Shino's idea of inviting Maho and Asuna to a Christmas dinner.

"Neh, Kazuto?" Shino said from the kitchen, her tone ripping the other teen out of his nap.

"Hmm?" "Well, I've just got a reply from Maho. She'll be coming over tonight. Apparently, she's also got herself a special someone. Should I get Asuna to come?"

"It's probably a good call… even though I still think that they should figure this whole thing out by themselves." Came Kazuto's reply, although his tone clearly indicated that he wasn't so sure whether this was a good idea. If they did this, three outcomes would be possible. The first one would entail Maho and Asuna getting mad at each other again and the second one being them ignoring each other, whilst the third one being them actually willing to rekindle their relationship.

"Well, let's just get the presents and message Asuna for now." Sinon said, already bringing up her friends list with a flick of her wrist. ' _Let's just hope that Maho doesn't eat Asuna alive… or freeze her over…_ '

And then, the two teenagers looked up in surprise as a message popped up in both their inboxes. Its content: patch notes.

" **Greetings, Players.  
A new Patch has just been applied to the public server of Sword Art Online.  
Due to it being Christmas, Players are allowed to go to the forest outside the Starting City and fell a tree there. This message contains a Christmas Axe, which does not require any skill to use, and a Teleport Two-Way Crystal* for you to use.  
*New Items:  
**Christmas Tree Décor: can be brought at any general merchant for 1 col.  
**Teleport Two-Way Crystal: can be reactivated to return to the location the user originally teleported from within a 48-hour time span. Expires if other Teleport Crystals are used. Cannot be used in combat.**

 ***New Extra Skill: Archery.  
**Acquired from some of the Player-bound quest series with bows as reward weapons.  
**Bow-crafting and arrow-crafting included in the extra skill.  
**To balance the superior range, there will be no aim assists and the low-tier bows will have low damage output.  
**Cannot be obtained if the player has committed crimes before.  
**Will be removed if the player commits crime.  
*Changes to the Player-bound quest series:  
**Players will now see the final reward for the quest series before accepting. (An exception still lies with the 5 UNIQUE ones)  
**more quests have been added. (Total: 1450 C, 750 UC, 200 R, 95 UR, 5 U)  
*Gems:  
**Gems now give additional residual effects or stat boosts to the weapon. (the Amount depends on gem type, cut and rarity.  
**Gems now have a hit-box.  
**Weapons now have especially designated gem-slots. They can be expanded by blacksmith socketing.  
*Changes to weapons and items:  
**(none relevant as of now)  
*Minor changes to boss' behavior and attack patterns.  
The Next patch will arrive somewhere around Easter."**

And the two did just that; getting presents for each other, Maho, Marie and Asuna. Oh, did I mention that you could store a tree in the inventory?

~Asnuna's PoV (1st person)

I just finished off the last **Venomous** **mite** as I received a message from Shino. It read:

"Hey, Asuna. We're having a Christmas dinner and you're invited to come over. We're starting at six. Regards, Sinon."

'So they're having a Christmas dinner… I wonder whether nee-chan is there. Let's just hope that she'll let me apologize…' In the end, I admit that it was indeed my fault that my sister is gone now. I shouldn't have snapped at her for wanting that _I_ am happy.

I've soaked in regret and self-loathing for a few days and, after that, shut my feelings away. We're trapped in a virtual world, so any disrupting feelings should wait until we clear the game. Right. That's what I've been doing for the last few days. I've power-leveled up till no more and am now at level 28 I've put 47 points into AGI and 10 less than that into my STR stat, totaling at 84.

My _**Epée**_ … well, where do I start… I've broken it down because it reminded me of onee-chan. Way too much. In the end it was worth it, though as I've got a custom made **Rapière** **rosé** from the **Hardened** **Steel** **Ingot** I salvaged. Its stats were considerably better than the **Epée** 's stats. The raw ATK was at 48 and it had a critical strike chance of 15%, which is plenty for an uncommon rapier. Effectively, though, the crit rate was at 20%, due to **Crit** **Up** , which is, unfortunately, the only residual effect that boosted the combat effectiveness of this blade. Yes, the blade also had a **AGI UP** perk but that was fairly irrelevant, boosting my AGI by a mere 2 points. I actually regret smelting down my **Epée** as it was a super rare weapon and had great residual effects, but it's too late for regret. One has to go forward eventually.

Well. Appearance-wise I haven't changed much, apart from wearing a hood. Again. I still wore my copper chestplate with my red leather tunic and leather pants. The only thing that changed were the boots. I've got myself some new dark red boots in Urbus.

Anyways, I think that I should get some rest before getting presents and prepare myself for the confrontation that is undoubtedly going to occur when I meet onee-chan.

I did just that.

 **TBC** _._

 **A/N: I'm not gonna ramble on about my life being horrible this time.**

 **Thoughts? Comments? Favorite scenes?**

 **If you feel inclined to do so, leave a review. Also, I think that i might rework the ending in a bit**

 **See you in two weeks :)**

 **Hope you enjoyed,**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **EDIT: Adjusted the levels a bit because i deemed them a wee bit too high. Added time-stamps, fixed some content.**


	7. Barcarolle of Froth - Part 1

**A/N: I just love how the supposedly 2 week long wait turned into five. Sorry again. Anywho, welcome to the next installment of SAO: The Spirit Blades!**

 **Enjoy!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV, time skip: 2 hrs.

The two teenagers were in their hotel room, getting their presents put into boxes and their tree decorated. To them, it was still a surprise that one could shrink a _massive_ tree into one's inventory… but when they took it out, the tree of course, it was a perfectly living room-friendly tree, ready to be decorated.

Eventually, after roughly half an hour, Maho and her girlfriend arrived at Shino's and Kazuto's hotel room. Both were surprised that Maho was actually with a girl rather than a boy, but neither one was judging. In fact, they were happy that maho was, at least temporarily, happy. After introducing themselves and exchanging plesantries, they started making dinner.

There was one problem left though. Asuna. Neither Shino nor Kazuto knew wether Asuna would approve of her sister's choice in significant other – her parents were not the most forward-thinking people.

After they've finished making dinner, Maho and Shino sat down and started catching up, whilst Marie was getting their presents under the tree and Kazuto was taking a nap. The two girls talked about anything, really. Apart from the happenings of the past few days and Maho's time in the USA.

Eventually, Asuna arrived at the Hotel room the others were located in. "Heyyyyyyy… sorry I'm late"

"… Of course, I mean Mum's been like-" Maho stopped in her tracks as she heard her sister's arrival being announced. ' _So she really is here… huh._ ' After a brief moment of collecting herself, she decided to be friendly, as if nothing had happened, afraid that the strained bond between them might lead to more negative emotions.

"Oh, hello, Asuna. How've you been?" She asked politely, awfully so. A grin accompanied her greeting, which didn't quite reach her eyes, which were as cold as Asuna's last sight of them.

"I'm fine. Thank you." Came Asuna's response. Not overly enthusiastic, but also not overly cold.

Marie, who's been following the conversation with interest, frowns at Maho's coldness. She recognized this particular trait of Maho's. Whenever she felt down, she shut herself in, putting on a mask to seem happy, or at least not to give off negative emotions. ' _This isn't good. If she goes on like this, she'll shut herself off from the world… eventually._ '

She then subtly whispers into Maho's ear: "Maho, this can't go on like this. We need to talk." And then, she stands up and strikes up a conversation with Shino.

Eventually, she receives a message from Maho, telling her that she'd talk with her after the party. This caused her to look for her girlfriend, only to find her sitting at the table, talking with Kazuto. She noticed Asuna heading towards them and braced herself for the confrontation that was undoubtedly going to happen.

Marie held out a hand, not letting the argument between the two sisters get between a good friendship. "Hey, I'm Marie, A.K.A. Sakura. Nice to meet ya." She greets, not exactly sure what to expect.

Asuna was actually surprised that Marie had greeted her as openly as that – she herself wasn't as open with strangers as Marie was. "Who are you?"

Immediately after having said that, Asuna winced. It came out a lot colder and ruder than she intended it to. She wasn't fond of strangers but her mother had at least taught her to be respectful to everybody.

But instead of the – expected – answer coming from Marie, it was Shino who sated Asuna's curiosity. "Asuna, this, as you already know, is Marie. She's Maho's girlfriend."

Asuna's eyes widened like saucers when she heard that Marie was Maho's girlfriend – she was raised traditionally after all – but didn't comment on that as she didn't want to upset Maho – or her girlfriend – even more. She had probably ripped apart the tiny fraction of a bond that they've rebuilt with the last incident and she didn't want to burn the remains of said bond by disapproving of Maho's choice of partner.

In the end, she settled on greeting Marie normally. "Hello. My name is Asuna, as you probably already know, and nice to meet you as well." That actually came out a lot friendlier than the last statement that came from Asuna.

"Let's have dinner, everyone." Said Shino, interrupting the starting conversation between Asuna and Marie. "Sure! Don't see why not." Said Marie, whose stomach growled in agreement.

"Hmmmm… is this new? I haven't heard my stomach growl in this game yet." Mused Marie, surprised that the developer had payed attention to such detail when coding the game.

The dinner consisted of fried chicken and Chāhan (fried rice), which was really tasty, and went smoothly, with Maho even opening up to some extent. The conversation between Asuna and her sister, though, was kept polite and to the tiniest amount on Maho's side, since she really didn't know how to deal with this situation. She almost didn't speak at all unless spoken to and her replies and comments to contribute to the conversation were mostly short and to the point.

Then, the five players started exchanging presents. Maho got a comfortable yellow sweater from Shino, a box of overpriced chocolates from Kazuto, a dozen HP pots from Asuna and a kitten plushie from Marie. Seeing the plushie, she asked: "Marie, you know that I'm not overly fond of kitten plushies, right? So why a kitten plushie out of all plushies?"

"Yeaaaa, it was either that or a panda. I chose the kitten because it's smaller. Also, you're not any fonder of pandas either." Came Marie's response, enlightening Maho on her choice of plushie. "You know, I always wanted a kitten. I just am not fond of kitten plushies. They just aren't as cuddly as their real-life counterparts," her girlfriend retorted, giggling. Marie herself got a green summer dress from Shino, an assortment of snacks from Kazuto and a similar kitten plushie from Maho. Asuna didn't get her anything since she didn't know that Marie would be attending the dinner.

Shino got a handful of **Teleport Crystals** from Asuna, a bunch of **Record Crystals** from Marie, gummy bears from Kazuto and a collection of rare **darkstone throwing knives** from Maho, who had acquired them as a rare drop from some elf.

Asuna got an auburn-colored skirt from Shino, some wine gums from Kazuto, a panda plushie from Marie - "Seriously?" – Maho - , and a cookbook from her sister. It came as a surprise, for Asuna, that Maho had gifted her anything at all considering their recent arguments. This fact made her feel even guiltier than she already did about the whole situation.

And last but not least, Kazuto. He got a pair of black pants from Shino, a sword forging guide from Maho, a gemstone from Marie imbued with **AGI up** **2** and a pair of black boots from Maho.

In the end, the five players chatted for a little bit longer before Asuna decided to call it a day and head to her hotel. This caused Marie to want to leave too, as she was quite tired. Thus, after some thank-you's from Maho and Marie, the duo left as well. Everyone parted with good mood… Apart from Maho, that is. She was in a bad mood because of the conversation that was going to happen because of her being all cold towards Asuna and she didn't like it one bit.

The girls walked down the road, heading towards the central plaza of **Rovia** , where they'd gotten themselves a hotel room at an inn.

"So, I know that you're gonna tell me to open up to Asuna more, Ree. Don't think that I don't know that I've been all cold towards her during the evening, avoiding her, also." Maho deadpanned, certainly not looking forward to having this talk with her girlfriend. She was in a bad mood because Marie, even though she should know that shutting herself away was a defense mechanism that helped her with coping with these situations, was telling her to not do this.

"Yes, I am. To be honest, I'd also like to know why you'd be so distant towards her. It's not like you, ya know?" Marie responded, trying to soothe the seething Maho. "I know that she's hurt you a lot but she's still your sister, damn it. You shouldn't be like this to family. Heck, you shouldn't be like this at all."

"Yeah. I guess you're right." Maho conceded. "But I'm still not certain whether I should go and apologize to Asuna. I feel like she's been doing fairly well without me helping her." Her tone was sad, almost as if she was reminding herself of the good times they had shared.

"Also, you, out of all people out there should know that I do this to cope with the hurt I associate with Asuna now. I'm doing this because I don't want to get myself into a situation like that again." Maho explained, honestly out of ideas.

"Anyways. Try being more approachable towards Asuna. If she tries to apologize, that'll make it a lot easier for her to do so. I know that bringing up your past is hard for you, but please, don't let your messed up past dictate your future, messing that up as well." Marie soothed, trying to put herself into Maho's position, looking at the problem from her girlfriend's point of view.

The girls arrived at the plaza when Marie suddenly pulled Maho into a hug. She tried to get Maho to open up towards Asuna forgetting that she should be there comforting her girlfriend instead of trying to mend said girlfriend's bond with her sister. Also, she felt incredibly stupid for trying exactly that. Maho was an extremely forgiving person when she really thought about it. With time, Maho was able to forgive practically anything reasonable. So she felt stupid for pushing Maho to do something she'd do in some time anyways.

Pulling herself out of the embrace, Marie apologized: "Sorry, M. I shouldn't have pushed you. I know that you're a very forgiving person. It's just the fact that your sister seemed so upset which led me to forget that. I should've given you some more time and helped you get over it but I didn't. Truly sorry."

Maho's only response to that was a smile and a soft kiss on Marie's lips. It was, like most of the kisses they shared so far, tender and loving. But this kiss tried to convey Maho's feelings towards the whole thing. How she was reluctant to forgive because she was afraid. How she tried to let Asuna in but couldn't do so. How she was completely and utterly amazed by Marie's ability to understand. How she hardly let Marie help her because she tried so hard not to let that incident bring her blossoming romance down.

The rest of the way to the hotel went in silence. It wasn't an awkward silence, but rather a silence of mutual understanding. A kind of silence that you could only share with someone who meant a lot to. The kind of silence that held many unspoken words and feelings, but those words and feelings didn't need to be conveyed because they were already understood.

When the girls got to their room in the hotel, still in a comfortable silence, they each took a shower and headed to bed, kissing once more and falling asleep quickly after.

~Kazuto's and Shino's PoV, time skip: -20 mins.

Kazuto and Shino were both situated in their hotel room, trying to see what had gone wrong in their attempts to mend the sisters' relationship with each other.

"I told you that it wasn't that good of an idea." Kazuto said, his tone somewhat sad, whilst reviewing the evening in his mind. ' _Great. Now if Maho wouldn't have shut herself in, I could've at least seen some kind of reaction from her towards Asuna._ '

"No you didn't. You said that it was probably a good call." Sinon replied, clearly sarcastic about her comment, trying to lighten the mood. In her mind, it was basically the same thing; revisiting the dinner and the happenings between the Yuuki sisters. ' _I mean I haven't seen Maho be so cold in… like… ever. She's always been acting more mature than her age but this… this is another level of coldness. I guess her time in the US must've been REALLY bad._ '

What she thought was true; Maho always did act more mature than her age suggested, not wearing her heart on her sleeve and being extremely soft-spoken, exuding elegance and grace when other people her age only showed how clumsy they were both in carrying themselves and the spoken language. She seemed often unapproachable when one didn't know her but warmed up to people fairly quickly. From time to time, she'd also drop her matureness and just let loose and have fun, but that only happened in private or when accompanied by her trusted friends.

"Well, I think that Maho still needs time to get over this one. She's a forgiving person if I've ever seen one, so that won't be the problem. Heck, she also forgave me for almost killing her during a panic attack." Shino winced at that memory, as it was one of the darkest moments of her life.

They were 10 and 12 at the time, Maho about to leave for MIT in a few weeks. The two girls were at Shino's place, happily munching on ice cream and watching TV. In one of the ads, a surprisingly realistic toy pistol was shown, triggering Shino's irrational fear of guns. She broke down, crying and sobbing as memories of that fateful day flooded her mind. Maho, being the caring friend she was, immediately wrapped herself around Shino, trying to soothe the younger girl.

But instead of calming down, Maho's soothing had the opposite effect. Shino got aggressive, pushing the other on the floor and choking her. Luckily, though, Shino recovered from her shock quickly when she noticed what she was doing and let off Maho equally quickly. This led to Maho being afraid from Shino – not that she could blame her for being afraid – and leaving rather quickly. After a few days, Maho went over to Shino's house, unannounced, and apologized for not being there for her friend, explaining that she was afraid and needed a bit of time. Shino waved her off, though, telling her that it was her fault for almost killing her best – and only – friend. Both then decided that they'd bury this accident in the past and, albeit reluctantly, forget about it. It was for the better of them after all.

Pulling herself out of that memory, Shino spoke up, trying to voice her thoughts even more. "Even if Asuna probably broke whatever faith Maho had in herself being able to mend their relationship, she'll get past that eventually. So if Asuna apologizes, she'll be perfectly fine… I think." ' _Maho should forgive her… right? She's her little sister after all._ ' She thought, sitting down and supporting her head on her hands.

"I mean… I didn't want to meddle in their affairs but I just don't like it if things are like this. Sisters shouldn't act like this towards each other… ever. It just isn't… right." Kazuto mused, clearly not happy about the current situation. "Yeah. I know first-hand how horrible it is to shut somebody out. I've done it myself every so often to my cousin Sugu."

"You're one to talk, Kazuto-kun. I mean you shut Sugu out for half your life." Shino said, reminding him of his actions. "Waaaaait… she's your cousin?" Shino asked after a few seconds, surprised.

Standing up from the dinner table and sitting down on an armchair in the middle of the room, Kazuto noticed that he hasn't told them about the actual family of his yet. "Yeaaaa… about that…. I found out that she was my cousin a few years ago. Then, I was shocked that my parents are dead. Add that on the frustration my adoptive family was giving me for quitting kendo and I quickly got mad at said family. This led to me shutting out my cousin and getting into a lot more gaming."

After the summary of Kazuto's, Shino wanted to speak up and tell him how sorry she was for him. But to her surprise, Kazuto continued: "… But that's beside the point. I never really realized how much I needed my family until a few months ago. This game has shown me that one should cherish family, for one might not be able to see them again after something fatal happening." Kazuto was sad now, but he got his point across; cherish what you have. You'll miss it if it's gone.

And then, Shino wrapped Kazuto into a hug, telling him that she's so sorry for his parents dying. Kazuto reciprocated the hug, grateful that he had a true friend in this world.

~Time Skip: 1 month, Asada Shino's PoV: (January 24th, 2023)

I just accepted a rare quest series that will lead me to a legendary bow, which is apparently called **Holy Bow Shekinah**. The quest master, a dark elf, told me to gather some pliable Osage wood for he'd show me the art of bow crafting as thanks for saving him. Eventually, after searching the forest of floor 8 over and over (with Kazuto's help), I found an Osage tree, which I (I still don't know how I did it) cut down and brought back to the elf.

He explained that my bow-crafting skills will improve with both my player level and my **Archery** skill level, so that the bows I crafted were always appropriate for my stats. The quality of the bow also depended on the raw materials used, them being wood, metals, fiber, and even gemstones.

These materials will determine the final outcome of the bow in terms of stats. As example, if the gemstone isn't compatible with the other materials, the bow's stats would be decreased. And different materials apparently have different attributes, too. The bowstring for bows could be acquired at elven villages, with them being pricier the better the stats one wanted to have. In the end, I was pretty happy to get this quest since it will eventually lead me to one of the best bows in the game.

I was pulled out of my thoughts as a message popped up in my inbox. It was from Asuna, asking me to go grinding with her as we are both around level 35 now. "One could never get high enough" she reasoned. I replied that I'd send a message to Kazuto and to meet me at the central plaza in **Friven**. I sent said message and headed off towards **Friven** right after.

~Maho Yuuki's PoV:

I frowned as I killed off the last **Lizard** **Soldier**. He, and his fifteen dead companions have been annoyingly difficult to kill, dodging my **Chronokeeper** 's skills and parrying my rapier blows. And to add insult to injury, my **Signet of the Cold** just broke on me. ' _Great. No 5% damage reduction for the next boss anymore,_ ' was the thing I thought until my menu prompted me to acknowledge a new item in my inventory. It was an item called **Pure dark steel Ingot** , which was, apparently, a crafting material to craft a blade. The description read: " **The remains of a once-famous blade that has been lost in the throes of history. All that remains of the once-pure blade of Ice is this ingot of darkened ice.** "

' _Apparently, this is ice, huh,_ ' was the thing that went through in my head when I materialized the ingot form my inventory. But I wasn't prepared for what was actually going to drop in my hand. It was a roughly 1 foot long, almost pitch black, cylindrically shaped piece of ice with a diameter of an inch and a half. ' _So this is ice. Damn, it's really cold. Let's see how I could get this forged. A NPC-Blacksmith probably has the best chances to get a good blade out of this ingot… if it doesn't melt in the first place…_ '

~Time skip: 1 week: (January 31st, 2023)

It seems that I couldn't find any blacksmith with a skill level high enough to forge a new blade out of this big old chunk o' ice. Either their high oven would freeze over after beginning to smelt the ice down (I dunno but SAO's mechanics apparently allowed one to forge ice but not water?) or they couldn't even start because they lacked the skills to forge a god forsaken rapier.

Anyhow, after like 20 failed attempts, I heard about a master blacksmith called Lisbeth, who took up shop in **Urbus**. Apparently, she could forge any kind of weapon out of any kind of workable material. Hearing that, I made my way down to **Urbus** and into her shop after having cleared the 15th floor boss.

"Hello? Anybody here?" I asked, opening the door to her shop. The shop itself was fairly small, having been modified from a small bar into a smithy. The customer area of the bar had been modified to fit daggers, hammers and everything in between, whereas the kitchen I can only imagine was replaced by the oven, power hammer and anvil.

"Yeah, I'll be right with you!" Came a voice from the kitchen-area, clearly female and fairly light-pitched. After a while, I saw a pink-haired lady walk out of the forge and into the shop. She was dressed in a kind of… waitress outfit? Well. It was a dress with an apron, at least.

"Welcome to Lisbeth's blacksmith shop!" Spoken in a way too cheery tone, was what tore me out of my thoughts once more. Then, I noticed that she was staring at something behind me like it was some kind of wonder that just happened in this world.

After roughly half a minute of her staring and me trying to figure out what was wrong, I noticed that my **Chronokeeper** was not in my inventory, but floating aimlessly around in my perimeter. Quickly fixing that, I formed an apology in my head: "Sorry 'bout that. Forgot to put it back into my inventory."

After that, she exploded.

No, not really. She just exploded in the sense of being right in my face and asking enough questions to turn my stomach into a giant, gaping hole if they were bullets. "What are they? How did you get them? What are their stats?" being only a few of them.

Trying to answer her with the best of my ability, I eventually succeeded in answering all her questions. After that, she finally asked me what I wanted. I answered that I wanted to have a piece of ice forged into a blade when she started laughing like a madman. "HAHAHA! How am I supposed to forge a blade of ice?" She asked, as if she thought that I was a wee bit crazy or something.

And then, she didn't.

After she saw what I had materialized into my hand, she stopped laughing, but started to stare at the ingot in awe and wonder. "Wait… isn't that like… actual ice?" She asked, still not believing that someone could acquire something like this in SAO.

"Yeah. It's ice." I handed her the ingot for her to inspect, completely ill-prepared for what she was going to tell me at the time.

"It isn't an ingot… not yet at least," she said after a while, confusion written in her features. "It's a quest item. For some kind of quest. How did ya get this?"

"My ring recently broke and the system told me to acknowledge a new item that just entered my inventory. It was that item," I explained, unsure of what was happening.

"Apparently, the quest master is on the first floor, in the **Black Iron Palace**." She explained, still wondering what this quest is.

~Time skip: 1 hour, Maho's and Diavel's PoV

Maho just arrived at the central plaza of the **Starting City** when she noticed a familiar figure clad in blues and whites approaching her. Internally sighing, she prepared herself for the potentially migraine-inducing conversation that was sure to happen.

"What do you want, Diavel? I'm really not in a mood to talk as of now." She said, in a more annoyed tone than originally intended. Turning to him, she sighed, waiting for his response.

"Irelia, I've actually got a few questions to ask you, as your behavior pattern simply eludes my mind. One day, you out yourself as queer and almost cut someone down for insulting your girlfriend, causing a huge commotion in the raid party, and the next day you casually carry the boss fight, not lashing out at anything, saving multiple lives. Why?"

Irelia simply sighed. As Diavel ran the boss party, keeping the players united, she had to more or less give him an explanation towards her behavior. After all, disorder only caused panic and trouble among one's ranks.

"Well, I'm just very protective when it comes to my loved ones. If someone dares to hurt them, either in real life or virtually, I won't hesitate to cut said someone down. It's just who I am. Someone who can't bear to sit in the sidelines watching their loved ones get hurt." Irelia explained, flashing Diavel a strained smile.

Whilst Diavel was shocked by the tiredness in Irelia's eyes, she continued. "I guess that you also wanted to find out why I didn't leave you to die in the first boss fight, don't cha?" She asked, which resulted in him nodding. "Well, I stepped in because I saw what you did to the raid party. You formed a working raid squad from a bunch of friends, party players and solo players. You inspired them to overcome the first boss, rallying their spirits. I guess that I was simply impressed and decided that you're worth saving."

Diavel now fully understood Irelia's perspective. Instead of greeding after fortunes, which is what he thought, she simply dedicated herself towards clearing the game. So she didn't actually want all the fame and glory attached to it. It was then when Diavel saw the flaws in his thinking; instead of focusing on a mutual goal, he let his greed reign and almost got himself killed. Only one person was compassionate enough to spend quite a chunk of their money back then to keep him alive.

"I guess I should apologize, then. For these last few months I've thought that you were just greeding after fame, exploiting other players to get what you wanted. Well, I was proven wrong. I simply hope that you can forgive me for making this grave mistake." He said, bowing his head.

Irelia was shocked, to say the least. Never did she expect Diavel to be apologizing for what he did and how he acted towards her. Just going along with it, she hoped to form a friendly bond with him. "Your apology is accepted, Diavel. And to be honest, I should apologize, too. I could've avoided this entire conflict by simply explaining what my motivations were, but I didn't. I hope that I didn't cause you that many headaches because of my ignorance. Friends?"

"Friends." Came Diavel's reply, along with a hand, which Irelia took without hesitance.

After some more talking, most of which were boss strategies for the 16th field boss, Irelia decided to get along with her plan and bid farewell to Diavel. As she made her way towards the **Black Iron Palace** , she got notified that the next boss raid was the day after tomorrow. ' _Just great. Now I'll have to deal with another bloody boss._ ' She thought, scowling.

As she entered the place where the **Resurrection Chamber** used to stand, she noticed that there were five chambers around the **Monument of Life** , with each one having a different theme to it; the leftmost one is styled in vibrant, burning reds, with a crest-shaped indentation on the rear wall. The chamber to the right of that is styled like a night sky, giving the observer a feeling as if they were in space. There is a star-shaped indentation on the rear wall.

Although the first two rooms were spectacular, it was the third room that took Irelia's breath away. There is a dragon perched on a mountain, along with what she presumed to be a warrior princess riding on said dragon, aiming a majestic looking longbow at the skies. Like the other rooms, it also had an indentation on the rear wall; this time, it was the shape of a very simple-looking bow.

The fourth room looked like it had been frozen over for millennia, with the ice-styled walls being relatively colorful, ranging from cyan to teal, thus telling her that it was a glacier of some kind. The indentation on the rear wall was a circle, that went surprisingly deep into the wall itself. ' _This is probably my quest,_ ' was the thing she thought before heading out to check the last room. The last room contained a depiction of yin and yang, surrounded by a bagua, hovering in perfect equilibrium, with the indentation consisting of a sphere.

After examining all the rooms, Irelia walked back to the icy room and materialized the rod of ice from her inventory. After inserting it, the room changed, expanding in width and depth alike. The slot for the rod is gone, with the rod itself now being located in the rear wall of the structure, standing vertically. After that, ten different indentations in the shape of different blades appeared, the leftmost being filled by the rod of ice. A gorgeous woman with light blue skin and white hair appeared, clad in a beautiful ice gown. When she spoke, the voice was beautiful, filled with an aura of power.

"Greetings, mortal. I am Skadi, the goddess of winter in this realm. By returning with a piece of eternal ice, and by knowing how to obtain it, you have proven yourself worthy of a champion's praise. Therefore I choose you to be my representative, my eyes and ears of this realm, for I have lost my reign to a traitor. Do you accept this quest?"

Then, a quest interface popped up in front of Irelia's eyes, which widened as she saw that it was a player-bound quest series and that the reward was hidden. That only meant one thing; She was standing in front of one of the five **Unique** classified quest series.

Considering the pros and cons of accepting this, she eventually reached the conclusion that accepting it would be best for this situation; less fools would die to this quest series and significant power will be added to the raid party. She clicked the accept button.

"Very well," the figure said. "By accepting this quest, you have tasked yourself of rebuilding my empire to its former glory. Eventually, when the time comes, I will pass down my crown to you, ascending you into the ranks of immortals. But for now, take this blade I crafted. It will do you good. Farewell, mortal." And then, Skadi, the goddess of winter, disappeared.

The weapon Irelia received was a rapier called **Frozen Black Steel Rapier** , which boasted an ATK of 75, a crit stat of 20%, and four different residual effects; **Icy** , **Fast** **Charge** , **Scavenger** and **Reinforced** , which was a very rare trait for a rapier.

The description read: " _ **A blade made of Black Steel, tempered with ice. Rumored to have been forged by the ice goddess Skadi herself. The blade is still cold as ice to the touch.**_ " Whilst the weapon itself looked like a standard rapier, with a broader blade and swept hilt. What was surprising was that the rapier's blade had a Damascus pattern to it, making it clear that the steel had been folded many times during the forging process.

Internally sighing, she checked whether the next quest was already available to her, which it was. In the end, she decided to take on the second quest right now. It would probably pay off more to complete this quest since she was over leveled for this floor anyways; she was experiencing the level differential system of MMOs.

Now that she didn't dedicate all her time to grinding anymore, she leveled a lot slower in comparison to before. She was now at level 37, with her STR at 54 and her AGI at 60. And this was the progress she made whilst clearing four floors!

Sighing from resignation, she looked up once more and took on the second quest.

~Time Skip: 3 weeks, Kirigaya Suguha's PoV: (February 21st, 2023)

I was sitting at home, bored, when mom decided to switch on the TV. Unable to hide my interest, I got out of my room and settled next to her on the couch. "…has recently proclaimed bankruptcy. RECT Progress will officially take charge of all of Argus' programs, including the responsibility for the 7800 people still alive in the VRMMORPG **Sword Art Online**. Further news will be disclosed in a press conference a few days from now."

' _So Argus went bankrupt after the SAO incident and RECT took over. Let's just hope that they're getting a few hackers to fix the NerVGear's software._ ' I thought, full of hope, now that another company had taken over Argus and would try to fix the servers for SAO. Maybe there was hope for getting Nii-chan back alive.

Mother just sighed. Whether in resignation or exhaustion, I did not know. But I think that she was having doubts on whether RECT could get through Kayaba's scripts. Sighing myself upon that, I simply prayed and hoped that it would work out in the end.

~Maho's PoV, time skip: 1 hour

I internally sighed as I sheathed my **Frostbite** after receiving my level up. Right now, I was at level 58, granting me 81 points of STR and 93 points of AGI. Due to this leveling, I've also gained two skill slots and have thus acquired three new skills; **Riposte** instead of **Parry** , **Extended** **Weight** **Limit** and **Searching**.

Appearance-wise, I haven't changed much, apart from having discarded my **Coat of Sunset** for the **Snow Princess' Cowl** ; it was basically an open-front coat that started with a teal-ish color, which faded into turquoise, light blue and white at the bottom. On the outer corners, a snowflake was embroidered on silver lining. It was a very beautiful – albeit cold looking – coat.

My new blade, the **Frostbite** , was awarded to me after I completed the second quest of my series. It was a blade crafted out of a steel spine, encased with ice and equipped with a diamond edge, giving it a very faint light blue hue. The sword had an ATK stat of 245, a crit stat of 20% and several different residual effects; **Icy** , **Scavenger** , **Fast** **Charge** , **Durability** **Shred** , **Pointed** and **AGI** **up (10)** , which combined with its high durability, made this into a wonderful sword for any combat situation.

Eventually, I got the message that we should be moving on to the 25th floor boss and that the meeting will take place tomorrow noon. Sighing, I decided to use the rest of the day by going to the higher dungeon floors and getting more grinding done. I also contemplated on inviting Kazuto and Shino to dinner with Marie and me to discuss some things for the next boss fight.

~Time skip: 2 hours

After I killed the last Elite Kobold Sentinel present, I found a pair of hands covering my eyes and a sweet voice talking into my ear: "Guess who?"

Turning around, my lips stretched into a grin as I saw Marie standing in front of me, clad in casual clothing. "Hey you." I said, poking her in the nose. "You wanna invite Kirito and Sinon for dinner? It'll be fun." I suggested, wanting to know her opinion on it before I decided.

"Sure. Under one condition. You'll cook." She smirked, thinking that I probably wasn't in the mood for cooking. But there was one problem in her equation; I only disliked to cook if I had to cook way too often in a certain period of time. The only reason she saw me seeing cooking as a nuisance was because I was annoyed by it all the time when she was around me; both in the US and right here in SAO. I was forced/reluctant to cook and unhappy because of it.

Even though cooking for Marie and me had been a bit less of a chore than usual, it was still more bother than pleasure for me. But cooking for friends _and_ essentially family was a whole other deal. I mean, there are more people who can appreciate the meal. Additionally, I haven't made a really nice meal for a few days, so I'd appreciate the workout.

"Fine. I'll cook. I have my **Cooking** skill on 950 anyways." I said, surprising her by agreeing so quickly and readily. "Why is it that you're never as enthused when you cook for me?" She mumbled under her breath, sighing afterwards.

Wanting to get the groceries and start cooking soon, I opted not to answer. Instead, I pecked her on the lips and wound myself out of her arms. "Let's get groceries." I said, in a sensual, teasing tone before walking away in front of a stunned Marie, putting extra emphasis on my hips.

It didn't elude me how her face was quickly as red as her strawberry-blonde hair, no doubt from watching me walk that teasingly.

 **A/N: Actually, there was supposed to be a second chapter but I need to write a bit in advance for my trip over to china, so no second chapter today.**

 **Thoughts? Comments? Favorite scenes? Constructive criticism?**

 **If you feel inclined to do so, leave a review.** **It really means a lot. Next chapter** **should** **be up in two weeks. (And if not, Blizzard's "Soon™" will apply)**

 **Anywho, hope you enjoyed and see you next time.**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 **EDIT (11/SEP/16) Added time-stamps, fixed minor content.**

 **A/N (EDIT): Well, I was severely unhappy with how many mistakes I made whilst writing this in the first place so I decided to fix everything I found in every chapter right there and then before I started writing a new chapter. Additionally, the Chinese government doesn't allow access to google, including google docs, which is what I use to write, and thus i haven't been able to write properly until a week ago. The chapters that are to come, I came to realize, contained major flaws, which will be edited soon or are being edited as you read this. Also, I've started a side project to this one, containing thoughts and drabbles i have affiliated to this fic.**


	8. Barcarolle of Froth - Part 2

**A/N: Actually, I wanted to upload this yesterday, but apparently, crashed or something. Oh well. On with the author's note.**

 **Well, I dunno how this update could've turned out to be this late, but I guess that I really can't help it. Whilst I've regained my inspiration to write after starting to really appreciate tea and resuming watching Anime, I can't say that my schedule got any better. I'm having less and less free time because of staggering uni work, and of said free time only a part is used for writing. I wrote this part up in roughly a week's time, which is really quick, considering. Chapters like this will be probably published with a 4-week interval whilst shorter ones will come after roughly 2 weeks. I've deleted all the other pre-written content (20+k words, mind you) since I just wasn't happy with how they turned out in terms of character development and how many time/date issues there were before. I've fixed/edited all of them on the published chaps but fixing them on the yet to be released ones would be tedious. And since I decided to somewhat deviate a bit from my original plot, those chaps were obsolete.**

 **A BIG THANK YOU to everybody who is sitting there and waiting for this to be updated, to everybody who is supporting this work and to everybody who's read this work, it really means a lot.**

 **As I said, sorry for late update. I hope you enjoy this chapter of SAO: The Spirit Blades.**

 **~Irelia Yuuki.**

 **DISCLAIMER: bla bla yadda yadda see chp.1.**

After we got our groceries done, we made our way back to our house, located on the eastern side of floor 22, which we've bought after the 24th floor boss has been cleared yesterday. Marie was fed up of the inn rooms and wanted a place to properly store her items. Honestly, I felt the same way. We've been having an excess of cash around because of selling the materials we acquired from grinding, no expenses to cover except for minor things and no place to really call home.

There was also the fact that the kitchens in hotel or inn rooms were either non-existent or really not fit for my level of cooking anymore, making cooking tedious and, sometimes, impossible. The not-so-expensive, decently sized cabin located not far away from **Coral** came as a perfect opportunity.

The cabin itself featured a decently sized bathroom (bathtub included), one bedroom with two beds, a large living/sitting/dining room, a small storage room and a really nice kitchen, separated from the living room. In general, it was cozy but spacious enough to accommodate two or three people comfortably.

I sat down on the armchair, pondering about the happenings of the last few weeks. We've been clearing floor bosses and field bosses on an almost daily basis, climbing up the floors on a pace faster than ever… well. Faster than two months ago. The players were getting more and more experienced, too, with the last death being at floor 14, roughly a month ago now.

Despite being present only once every two floor bosses, and doing less grinding than we were used to doing in-between said raids, I was slowly but surely getting tired. I don't know about Marie, but I suspect that she's been tiring, too. ' _I've got the feeling that something horrible is going to happen if we keep up this pace…_ '

"Penny for your thoughts?" She asked after sitting down on the couch, throwing me out of my thoughts. "I've just been pondering about the last few months. The people have been clearing a boss, be it field or floor, almost every day for roughly six or seven weeks now… I wonder if they are starting to get tired, per se. The feeling of something bad happening is also returning, now stronger than ever."

After receiving a nod from Marie, I resumed thinking about all the things that have changed over the last few months. Some were for the better, and some were for worse.

Thinking. I did that a lot recently. About my past, my actions, my present. With Marie's help, I started to realize that my past was slowly eating away at me, my nightmares tormenting me and the fear of getting hurt consuming me. In retrospect, it was fairly clear what I had to do.

I had to let go. I had to make peace with my demons and try to understand my past, letting go of the fear of getting hurt. In the end, I felt that doing so wasn't so hard. It was simply trying to properly communicate with others and understand yourself.

There were still a few events that sent me into an anxiety attack when mentioned, but those… those wounds would take quite a while to mend, even though I almost killed the people responsible for causing them. (And to be frank, no one, not even Marie, knows about _those_ things.) In general, I'm now better at coping with my past than I was still a few weeks ago.

But there were things that changed for the worse, too. My bond with Asuna a prime example. Even though I've forgiven her for what happened back then, she still seems to avoid all contact with me. I mean, I haven't really talked to her, but I guess she still needs time.

"Well. I can only hope that your feeling isn't justified." Marie's voice once more pulled me out of my thoughts. "Well. Taking a break from everything does sound like a decent idea. Clearing bosses, grinding, scouting and more grinding sounds… grindy. Pun intended. And with this grind comes the risk. There could be always something unexpected happening and wiping you out from this world. And from the real world. Poof. Gone."

After that was said, I was left pretty much speechless, since I really didn't know what to add to that statement. After all that's been said, I feel a bit insignificant in this world.

"And if we go by Murphy's Law, everything that could happen _will_ happen." Marie added, causing me to shudder. A silence covered the living room once again.

After a while of pondering and staring into emptiness, I noted that Marie seemed a bit off. She was distressed. Probably afraid, too. This made me want to comfort her, moving myself to her on the couch, I wrapped an arm around her shoulder, her head coming to rest on my shoulder.

"Hey. Don't worry. Nothing is going to happen. We're gonna clear this game, return to the real world, get our lives back on track and be together for real. After all, I… I… I love you and I'll be damned if I let anything happen to you. I will protect you. No matter what happens. After all, I'm still sane only because of _you._ " My rambling was brought to an abrupt halt, the rosy lips of my girlfriend's pressing on my own.

The kiss started out innocently enough, but soon I felt her nibbling on my lower lip, begging for entrance. It was half a second later our tongues met in a passionate dance, fighting for dominance. After a few more seconds of fighting, I gave up and let her explore my mouth, butterflies churning in my stomach all the while.

After roughly half a minute, we separated, the need for air becoming too strong for the both of us to carry on with our passionate moment. "I love you too." Marie said, burying her head into my shoulder, unshed tears evident by her voice. "I honestly don't know what I'd be or where I'd end up without you. Even though, from your point of view, I always helped you out, it was actually _I myself_ that needed saving."

I looked down on her strawberry-blonde hair in surprise when she continued. "I was in a dark pit of despair before I met you, having been cheated on by my boyfriend with not one, not two, but three other girls. I was thirteen at the time, he was fourteen. We were young. Yes. But he had also managed to capture, and fool, my not-so-easily fooled heart. As I found out, my heart broke, along with any semblance of trust I could put in most people. I shut myself in for two weeks, weeping and bawling my eyes out. I barely ate, couldn't sleep and tears were flowing as soon as I had recovered them."

I was shocked by this revelation since the Marie I knew back then was so upbeat in nature, so cheery that nothing could darken her day. Apparently, I've been proven wrong. My thoughts didn't go any further than that before she continued.

"It was the end of summer break that broke me out of my stupor. As you know as well as I do, I started studying in MIT with a stipendium then. Studying brought my mind off things for the first few weeks I studied, until I noticed a certain brunette someone getting bullied in school. After I first took notice of you, you being the only one able to get through to me, I noticed your strength. Even with getting bullied like that, you refused to back down, keeping your chin up and your posture proud. At first, you didn't let them get to you, but with every passing day, I saw your resolve crumble a bit. And with every passing day, the bullying got worse."

I realized that Marie had, even before we officially met, noticed me getting bullied, and noticed my will crumble with the time. She was observing me from a distance, watching me go through some serious bullying and the start of a depression. Before I could get angry at her, though, I thought for myself what I would've done when our positions were switched.

To be true, I wouldn't have done anything, probably, because of me being too distrusting after having my heart broken and me having a semi-shy personality to boot. I mean, it took me half a year of building up my courage to confess to my best friend. My thoughts were once again interrupted when she continued.

"I don't know what made me approach you that fateful day, but something in my head was telling me that I'd be a bad human being if I left you there to suffer. In the end, I decided checking up on you on pure instinct. I found you near your locker, with Scar, Fred and Alice already having left. Even though you were soaked to the bone, you stood proudly, posture impeccable and a defying glint in your eyes."

I knew what happened next. When Marie approached me, I spun around to face her, afraid that something might happen. But when nothing did, I collapsed on the ground and, a few seconds later, passed out cold. A few hours later, I found myself on Marie's bed, in clean PJ's with dried hair. Marie just walked in when I woke up, a plate with eggs and bacon in her left and a mug of Darjeeling in her right. I then ate and we talked for roughly two hours, mostly her cheering me up and telling me not to give up and that she'd be there for me.

Her recounting of these events was similar, adding the fact that she had seen a fragment of herself in me. She also stated that she didn't want to see my spirit be crushed like hers when she got her heart broken, for it would be just a matter of time before I would've crumbled. And if I crumbled and got into depression, I wouldn't come out so quickly, since this would still be going on, unlike finding out your boyfriend was cheating. After these admissions, she started sobbing into my shoulder.

I started stroking her strawberry-blonde locks when she continued to talk between sobs. "The thing is, I love you. I love you so damn much I'm afraid of what will happen if you disappear from my life. I honestly don't know if what I would do if you were gone. I don't think I would even know how to keep living if you were gone. Our time together in the US has mended my then broken heart in every way, and all of that because of the friendship we shared. I learned to trust again… and eventually, how to love again, too."

After that, she went silent, still occasionally sobbing whilst I simply ran my fingers through her hair and rubbed circles on her back in the most comforting manner I knew. Roughly five minutes later, she resumed telling her tale.

"When you confessed, back then at the airport, I was afraid. I knew that I probably had some more than friendly feelings for you. But I also knew that my parents wouldn't approve. And I was afraid. Afraid of both our hearts breaking if something bad happened. Afraid of our parents braking us apart or something similar. I trusted you and knew you trusted me, too but I was even more afraid of us not working out. The thing is, after you left, I felt… empty. As if I was missing something. A month passed and my mood gradually dropped, until my crush from our 2nd year, James, approached me, asking me out for a date."

Marie's sobbing became less and less during the recounting of the events, eventually stopping at the end of the last sentence. She looked up, some unshed tears in her eyes, a bright smile on her face. I got out a handkerchief from my inventory and wiped the tears that have already flowed down her face away, whilst she resumed talking.

"The date was, all in all, what I'd describe as a so-called 'perfect date'. James was the perfect gentleman all the time, treating me to a fine meal in the restaurant 'Harvest' and watching a movie with me afterwards. During the date, I was acting all happy and upbeat, but my mood wasn't really any good. My thoughts always went back to you and how you'd known that I'd prefer a good burger instead of a high end meal, or how you would know that I hate sappy romance movies, preferring the sci-fi genre instead. In the end, my mood didn't really improve. And after he dropped me off back at my place, he asked if I'd be his girlfriend. After getting no response, he moved in for a kiss. And that's exactly when I snapped. Shortly before our lips met, I was reminded of your confession on the airport, my thoughts straying off and thinking about a kiss between us. As a couple. Unsurprisingly, I found the idea not at all appalling. It was then that I noticed the full extent of my feelings towards you."

She then proceeded to talk about how she had already applied for a job as game developer (programmer) at Bandai Namco two weeks after I had left, indicating that, a few days after her date, it had been accepted. Quote: "We'd be stupid not to accept an application from such a talented, young, energetic graduate, an alumni from the MIT Massachusetts to boot." The letter also told her that the company would be providing the rent for a flat in Tokyo for two months and that she'd move there in July. Her work would start two weeks after that, after she's accustomed herself to her new living arrangements.

"And after I arrived there, I spent one week unpacking and the other searching for you. Since your American number was gone and you didn't give me an address, it took me the better part of the week to figure out where you were living. I mean, knowing you, I assumed that you'd be living in a flat or a house of your own. Contacting you on skype or something was a no-go since I wanted to make this, I mean my confession of sorts, a surprise. And after I found out where you lived, work got in the way, and then you were gone – your mom is a scary woman, by the way – and then SAO happened and the rest is history."

After she finished speaking, a smile crept on my face as I started to think about how everything turned out. Only a few seconds later, though, a surprised expression took over as I processed that she'd actually met mom. "Ye met my mother?" I asked, my tone as surprised as my expression was.

"Yea, I went to your house explaining that I was a friend of yours whilst you were studying in the US and accepted a job over here. And since I just moved there, I told her, I asked whether you'd be available sometime soon to help me familiarize with the area around here and so on. And well, since it was August back then, you were in the states. Your mom was fairly… apprehensive of me being there, I guess, but after showing her my yearbook she sort of relaxed a bit."

After learning that, I chuckled. "I was in the US because some annoying dude has claimed that my thesis on actually usable personal service AI and their potential learning curves using .cfg, .json and advanced database programming would be copied from his research. And since I only used like 6 or 7 months on this thesis, the faculties have deemed it necessary to research it. I mean, needing 19 months for bachelor and master degrees and 15 for two highly advanced philosophical doctorate theses does sound a bit dubious despite being very intelligent. Too bad that I actually proved that I've written all of that since all the source code and text of the thesis have been key-logged with respective time-stamps, the sources proven and the evaluation reconfirmed. And then, I did some research – a.k.a. used an algorithm to do said research – and found that his thesis on applied AI in industry and economy was copied from another's work that dated a few years back. Well. Let's just say that he wasn't the happiest when he got his PhD title stripped away from him."

At that, Marie laughed out loud. "And there I thought that your thesis on the theoretical behavior of gravitons in a wormhole would get challenged." After she said that, enticing a giggle on my side, she turned in my embrace so that we could snuggle better and got out a cute blanket from her inventory, which then wrapped itself around us.

"Yea. Doubting a thesis that has been deemed plausible by the big-shot professors at the institute sounds totally reasonable and not redundant at all." I replied, getting a very, _very_ adorable giggle from her. After that, silence enveloped us much like the blanket did just a few moments ago. We spent the next hour or so simply cuddling on the couch, enjoying each other's presence.

After that, though, I got up, winding myself out of the embrace we found ourselves in cuddling. Someone had to cook dinner, right? I inwardly rolled my eyes when I heard my now asleep girlfriend groan in annoyance.

The fact that we were expecting guests was also a rather… pressing issue here. Kazuto and Shino were due to arrive in about forty five minutes. Just enough for the dish I was planning to make. Well. I wonder if Kayaba Akihiko added some western food because I was feeling like some pasta.

So in the end, it turned out that Kayaba didn't add actual western pasta into the game, which was kind of sad, but I did find out that he added traditional ramen noodles. And since I really like ramen, I just went ahead and made that for dinner.

~Time Skip: 1 hour (February 21st, 2022)

Marie and I were sitting across from Kazuto and Shino at our dinner table, going over our stats for the last time before the boss meeting whilst eating Ramen, intending to be as prepared as possible for the 25th boss fight. Lately, specifically in the last three weeks, we've been clearing a floor roughly every two or three days, which was a fairly drastic rise in pace.

Of course not everybody was always present, as I heard from Kirito, Sinon, Argo and Diavel respectively. The first two were, just like Marie and me, present every two bosses, whilst Diavel fought every boss and Argo being present once roughly every three bosses. From Diavel I also heard that Asuna only missed one boss fight, having had some catch-up farming to do.

Level-wise, Kazuo and Shino have caught up to Marie and me, surprising all of us. Of course, it was because we were busy 'being lovey dovey', as Shino put it. They were both level 57, missing a tiny bit to their next level-up. Skills wise, they both have nine skill slots, one extra from the beta-test and eight due to leveling. Whilst Kazuto ran the **One-Handed Sword** , **Battle Healing** , **Searching** , **Riposte** instead of **Parry** , **First Aid** , **Martial Arts** , **Fishing** , **Extended Weight Limit** and **Blade Throwing** skills, Shino used the **One-Handed Dagger** , **Blade Throwing** , **Searching** , **Hiding** , **Acrobatics** , **First Aid** , **Martial Arts** , **Archery** and **Extended Weight Limit** skills.

Stats-wise, they've improved, too. Kazuto had 75 points in AGI and 96 in STR whilst Shino had her points distributed the other way around.

Marie had leveled up to level 58 as well, granting her 87 points in both AGI and STR and nine skill slots. One from an Easter-egg and eight from leveling. Her skills were actually similar to Kazuto's, with **Sprint** , **Hiding** , **Acrobatics** and **Cooking** instead of **First Aid** , **Martial Arts** , **Blade Throwing** and **Fishing**.

"Well… Strategy-wise, there isn't really much to say. The scouting party reported some kind of giant humanoid boss with a hammer. I guess that he'll have a decent amount of damage coupled with high durability, making him hard as hell to kill." Shino said, effectively giving us a rundown of what she thought about the boss.

The conversation then sort of died again, everybody thinking about the information. I've been using the time to enjoy my noodles, though. It was then that I noticed that I was the only one _not_ neglecting my noodles. And that's when I noticed something was off. "Say, Shino. How'd you get this info in the first place, I thought you didn't have any connections to the scouts."

At that, Shino blushed. And that blush gave me an idea of what has happened. Due to respect for her, though, I didn't just say it outright. It didn't take long for Shino to spill the beans though. "Well, I met with Diavel for lunch. He apparently likes me, so he asked me out for a date today. And since that topic got brought up during the conversation, I filed the information he gave me away for later use."

At that, I uttered a chuckle and, after a mouthful of ramen, replied: "Well. I didn't know that he'd make a move _this_ quickly." That got me surprised stares from everybody present. I just continued eating.

Shino was the first to regain her composure and asked: "How did you know that he'd ask me out?!"

"Simple. He asked me for advice on how to ask you out. Because we are… sort of… kind of… friends, I guess, he knew that we were friends for a long time. So we met up after a boss a few days ago and he asked me." My reply caused her to nod and the others to chuckle. And once more, I turned my focus of attention back to my bowl of ramen, not wanting the noodles to turn stale.

"So that's why he knew my likes and dislikes like a book." Shino muttered under her breath, still stunned by the fact that Diavel had actually asked me for advice.

After that, Marie apparently had enough of the current subjects of conversation, so she changed it entirely. "How'd you find the food?" She asked, causing me to look up from my bowl in surprise.

' _That voice. If Marie uses that voice, it usually means that somebody is about to get teased so hard that said someone would just like to die,_ ' were my last thoughts before Kirito replied.

"It's really good. My compliments to the chef, because I doubt that Shino has ever made ramen this good when we were at her place." And even though Shino didn't like the comment, she refrained herself from smacking Kazuto, since it was true.

"Yea. It is really good. I really couldn't make ramen this good. The _namamen_ ( **A/N: The Japanese term for fresh ramen noodles.** ) are done perfectly and the soy sauce taste was perfectly done. My compliments to you, Maho. You've outdone yourself with this one," was what said. Quite flattering indeed, am I right?

That piqued Kazuto's curiosity, though, since he didn't know of anything in the game that tasted like soy sauce, which is the main source of taste for the Shoyu-ramen. "Hold up. I didn't think that there were ingredients that tasted like soy sauce in the game. So how did you get this taste so genuine?"

After I chuckled at his question, I opened up my menu and brought up my cooking notes from my notebook tab, enjoying the wide eyes and dropped jaws from Kazuto, Shino and Marie. "Let's just say that I liked to experiment back in the alpha."

"The thing is, after I resumed cooking (and experimenting) in the release version of SAO, I noticed that my notes section wasn't empty. It still contained the cooking notes I wrote from the alpha. Apparently, the admins went through the notes and deleted everything on game knowledge, such as drop rates, attack patterns, quest strategies, et cetera but left the other notes as is. At least that's how I and a few other alpha testers can see it." I explained, getting sounds of confirmation from the three.

Hiding my notes again, I noticed my girlfriend mutter under her breath: "And despite you having all that knowledge, you still dislike to cook for the two of us." Raising her voice so that the other two could hear, she continued: "Well. Despite being this good, Maho only rarely cooks. I mean I literally have to force her to do so sometimes."

That made Shino chuckle. "Well. Maho. You really, _really_ haven't changed a bit since you left for the States. From your sleeping habits to your dislike for repetitive or stale tasks. It's all stayed the same," was what she had to say to this.

Kazuto was far keener on teasing me, though, as he said, with fake outrage: "Maho! How could you deprive your girlfriend of such delicious cooking?! Are you really that evil?"

That question actually made me grin, because it's a reference to what happened sometime back in October, when we were playing league. I was being my usual, annoying self, making my enemies tilt and rage-quit. After five consecutive wins and four consecutive enemies' rage-quitting, Kazuto dubbed me the 'Untouchable Evil Queen of Top Lane', claiming that I was the most evil individual he knew when we were playing ranked queue.

With that, I also had my counter be a reference to back then. "Maybe I really am that evil. But if I were really evil, I wouldn't cook at all. After all, it's not _me_ who wants to eat the food I cook. Am I right?"

We then all laughed except for Marie, who just looked a bit resigned at the fact that Maho somehow got her to be the teased one again. This in turn caused her to turn her attention to the bowl of ramen in front of her, which was still half full. After swallowing a mouthful of noodles, she made a grimace.

"Damn. Kayaba really made this realistic, didn't he? Even the noodles turn stale," Marie commented, her voice sad since she completely forgot about her noodles. When Kazuto and Shino resumed eating, they said similar things.

Seeing that, I offered to make a new batch of ramen for them, which turned Marie's frown upside down and got me some smiles from Shino and Kazuto too.

With that, I made my way to the kitchen, getting the ramen done.

After that, not much really happened. The conversation switched into the silly direction, the food was luckily not almost ignored once more and the mood was happy. And after Kazuto and Shino left, we just snuggled on the couch, cuddling, with Marie dozing off soon after. I then carried her to her bed and tucked her in, taking a shower and turning in for the night myself.

~The next day (22nd February, 2022)

I woke up after a night of dreamless sleep with a familiar feeling on my lips and a pair of arms holding my upper body upright. Easing into the kiss and kissing back, I simply enjoyed this wake-up call my girlfriend was giving me, my mind clearing and clouding at the same time, for different reasons.

Luckily, or not, for me, the kiss only lasted for a few more seconds, the need for oxygen driving us apart.

"Mmmmm. That was one nice wake-up call if I ever knew one. Good morning," I greeted, moving myself to the edge of the bed.

After getting a "morning" as response from Marie, I stood up and moved myself to the bathroom, intent on having a refreshing morning shower before anything else.

After my shower, I made breakfast whilst Marie was brewing a tea. We then had eggs, bacon and tea for breakfast. Surprisingly British, if I may add.

After that, we headed to the boss meeting and hoped that everything would turn out for the best.

~Asuna's PoV, time skip: 30 mins:

Asuna arrived at the raid meeting just as it started, since she set her alarm an hour too late. She now wore a gray colored **Plain Chestplate** with a sleeveless one-piece that was white at the top and light brown at the bottom, along with white long fingerless gloves that almost acted as sleeves. Her rapier, the **Rapière** **rosé** was in its rose red sheath, attached to her hip.

Mentally, she went over her stats once more before checking in with Diavel and Lind. Asuna was level 56 with 90 points in AGI and 78 points in STR. Her nine skills were composed of **One-Handed Rapier** , **Riposte** , **Hiding** , **Acrobatics** , **First Aid** , **Cooking** , **Extended Weight Limit** , **Sprint** and **Battle Healing**.

"Yo, Asuna!"

The voice belonged to Kirito, who was walking towards her, his Swordmaster's Pride, a one-handed sword that looked somewhat alike to the Master Sword from the old _Zelda_ -franchise, sheathed on his back.

"Kirito-kun! Good morning!" She greeted when Kirito approached, flashing a quick smile. Roughly half a minute after starting the conversation, Sinon joined in, along with Sakura and Irelia. "Good morning, Sinon-chan, Sakura-san, Onee-chan," she greeted them, receiving similar responses in return.

By the tone of Asuna's voice, one could tell that she was trying to hide her growing confusion. She was speaking with her sister for the first time since that incident and, what confused her, didn't make the first move. It was actually Maho who came up and casually greeted her.

And on top of that, Maho's tone was the soothing, calm tone Asuna was used to when talking to her sister before all that's happened. This further confused Asuna, who was expecting an icy demeanor and no emotion whatsoever from Maho.

After Asuna simply decided to think about this later, she was capable of actually contributing to the conversation. Stats were exchanged, strategies revised, items double checked, weapons upgraded and armor fixed before the entire raid party of 150 people departed in direction labyrinth.

~Maho's PoV:

I internally sighed as my **Chronokeeper** blocked another hit from the giant king's hammer. I was in a dire situation right now; the two-headed freaking giant king towering over me and the rest of the raid party backing away to heal. Of course my **Chronokeeper** can block his attacks. But it was just a matter of time 'till my blades' durability runs out. Luckily, the **Chronokeeper** is resilient against displacement. It follows the directions of the mind, as already stated, and thus is locked in position as long as I wish it to be. One thing I've found out about during my time using this is that the weapon itself is unbreakable. Like, actually unbreakable. But if its durability ran out, it'd drop down on the floor, unable to levitate itself any longer. And no longer controllable with the mind. And no longer able to deal damage. (But that one's a given.)

Well, here's some info on the boss. It's a giant-ass (roughly 8 or 9 meters tall), mad-ass, human-looking, male, two-headed, heavily armored son of a b*tch. Its attack patterns were simple, but the damage insanely high. Also, it boasted annoyingly large AoE paralyzes and stuns with little to no cast time, off which he is able to start a combo from. Luckily for us, though, the boss had a weakpoint at where his necks joined his torso. If he's hit there, he'll flinch for roughly 2 seconds and be unable to cast his AoE bullshit for roughly 10 to 20 seconds. This can only happen once every so often, though. Once every minute would be my guess. In general, this left us pretty out of breath after the last floor boss, which was fairly easy. Also, apparently he won't calm down once enraged.

So… I've been sitting here fighting the boss with the raid party for about two hours and we made some progress. The boss had 4 HP bars, of which we already cleared 2 and a half. Since then (roughly 45 minutes ago), he's been enraged and started repeatedly spamming his AoE abilities. Said abilities were really annoying, as their cast times got _even shorter_ and the damage even higher when enraged. He's already taken out two or three players, giving me the feeling that more casualties were to follow. Oh. Yeah. Did I mention that his AGI is doubled when enraged?

Luckily, though, my wonderful girlfriend was still unharmed, dodging his seemingly endless barrage of AoE attacks easily whilst dragging his agro to her person. She's turned into a very versatile fighter, unmeasurably valuable to the raid party (when she felt cocky, she'd get the agro of the boss and just dance between his strikes, almost giving me a heart attack each time). As of now, we, as in Kirito, Sinon, Asuna, Sakura and I (plus roughly 3 others) were dishing out roughly 50% of the damage of the entire party. We operated this way; occasionally, Sinon or I would hit his weakpoint using our superior range (of course, in my case, getting behind tanks and up close to the boss before that), getting him to flinch. Kirito and Asuna would then follow up using all their stuns on the boss whilst Sakura tried to get his attention by tempting him to hit her. And by the time the boss actually turned around to face her, she'd be gone already.

This made fighting the boss more a tedious hassle than a real danger for us. But for the others, it was a whole other deal. They were not nearly as strong, skilled nor as geared out as us, thus constantly being endangered by the boss' AoE damage when they tried to deal some damage themselves. Oh, I should also mention that roughly 40 out of 150 people from the established raid party have died due to Kibaou's stupidity; he took 40 men with him and charged the boss due to him being misinformed. Out of said 40, 25 were dead. In an attempt to rescue the 15 who were still alive, roughly a dozen of players died.

I mean that boss would have, with my stats and gear, probably taken out 25 or 30 % of my HP with one hit. The rest of the party… well… he'd have taken out roughly 35-42% of theirs. Even if the others were tanky, he'd take out roughly a quarter of their HP-bars. This, again, showed us how dire the others' situation is and explains why Kibaou's group died away so quickly.

Also, even though I spent quite a bit of my money on **Antidote Crystals** , we seem to be running out of them. It also doesn't help that I've been focused by the boss… fairly hard (despite Sakura trying to get his agro all the time), which severely limits my damage output.

The others were doing their best to get some damage through, but it just seemed difficult as the boss was getting more agile the lower his HP got. Also, he seemed to be channeling something then. What he channeled, I didn't want to know. Because it certainly looks like it will spell our demise when it hits.

It was at that time one of the strongest tanks, Heathcliff, contacted me: "Irelia, get behind me. I'll block his assault and you get ready to strike him using your highest damage skills!"

Weighing the options I had, this seemed by far the best route to take. It was risky, but it could work. (Doing some quick math in my head, I came to the conclusion that I probably could take a HP bar out with one full combo.) But he wasn't done with his strategy yet: "Agil! Hit the boss with the longest stun you have when I block! It should buy Sinon enough time to make him flinch again."

Quickly strategizing a follow up to Heathcliff's plan, I told my companions the plan. "Kirito! Sakura! Asuna! After my skill is completed, jump on my blades. He'll be stunned long enough for me to fling you upwards to his torso and get a ton of damage off!"

After having received nods of confirmation from my companions, I concentrated on the **Chronokeeper** that was idly orbiting me and moved behind Heathcliff. The boss had completed its channel by then and was now rushing towards us, holding his hammer to start a spin.

And then, he didn't. No, I'm not joking. Heathcliff single-handedly blocked the boss' probably strongest attack as of yet and didn't even loose that much HP doing so. I meanwhile prepared to use my highest damage skill; **Divine Judgement**. Once Agil stunned the boss and Sinon made it flinch, I dashed towards it, my blades leading the way.

Roughly five seconds later (and me having chained a **Quadruple Pain** with a **Diagonal Hexagon** , my sword skill had ended and the boss had one HP-bar left. Sakura jumped up my blades first, me boosting her up as good as possible. She opened with a **Serration Wave** , effectively stopping the boss' movements and landed gracefully behind him, dashing away whilst the boss was still stunned.

Meanwhile, Kirito was boosted in the air, starting a **Sharp Nail** and successfully hitting the boss' weakpoint, doing more damage but, sadly, not making it flinch. In the end, it did roughly a tenth of the boss' HP bar as damage.

After Kirito landed, the boss recovered from its flinch status and let out an ear shattering battle cry. He was, if it was possible, even more enraged than before.

My eyes widened in shock as I saw the boss charging towards us. Wait! This isn't a normal attack pattern! The boss is trying to trample us to death! Trying to get the raid party to step aside, I shouted, as loud as I could, into the party: "Look out! He's trying to trample us to death! Sidestep!"

The party semi-complied, getting out of the way as fast as possible. But even then, a few people got caught out and died instantly to the boss' raging stampede.

That wasn't the worst part of this, though. After the boss finished steamrolling us, he started to walk the way back, swinging his hammer back and forth, from side to side of the chamber. And if the damage from the stampede wasn't enough, the whole room got stunned for an indefinite timer.

That's when Heathcliff, who had counteracted the stun using an **Antidote Crystal** stepped in. With his shield, he stopped the boss' AoE attack and even stunned him for 3 seconds, allowing me and the rest to recover and heal up the damage we took.

Seeing that only one skill of the Chronokeeper was up and adding in the fact that I was just about willing to do anything to kill the boss at the time, I activated the last remaining skill; **Heaven's Gates**. The blades surged towards the boss, aimed for its torso, and hit home. After impaling the boss, they split apart from their spearhead formation as if they were cutting through air. Being done with that, I noticed their presence at my side. The boss had two-thirds of his last HP bar remaining.

Weighing the options I had, I decided that falling back for a few minutes as my cooldowns all still took too long to complete. ' _I swear, ten to twenty minutes cooldown for a non-reliable sword skill is just waaaay too much._ ' And launching a counterattack, seeing that the boss is very enraged, sounded suicidal, despite us having a very good chance at stopping his combos and stunning him.

"Guys! I'm gonna fall back for a bit! Cooldowns are still at five minutes!" I shouted, hoping that Heathcliff and the other tanks could tank for that long. "No worries, we got you covered." Heathcliff said with a grin, causing me to sigh in relief. "Thanks."

No sooner than the five minutes having passed, I noticed that Asuna was in a precarious situation, the boss harassing her and a part of the raid party with a barrage of AoE stuns. Not thinking too much about it, I rushed towards her, trying to get her out of the way from the boss' agro.

And then, she got hit. With a stun. The boss was charging up his next blow and there was nothing I could do to stop it; Heathcliff, Sakura, Sinon and Kirito were all potting up some damage they took and exhausted to boot. The rest of the party either got knocked away and stunned, rendering them immobile, or were healing up. Additionally, Asuna's HP were at roughly 30%, meaning that, if the boss hit, she'd be very probably dead with the next blow.

Not seeing any other option, I placed my **Chronokeeper** in the hammer's path, me getting between the blades and Asuna in a blocking stance, hoping that my blades could still hold out for another blow. I readied myself in a blocking stance, bracing for impact whilst hoping that enough durability remained for the blades to hold.

They didn't. As the hammer connected, they just flew aside, as if they were particles of dust being pushed around. The hammer connected with my upper body. Full force. Despite me blocking.

"ONEE-CHAN!"

The force of the blow threw me against the wall of the boss chamber, the impact with the wall probably also dealing some additional damage. The **Frostbite** was knocked away, too. Noting that my HP, which were at 90%, were into a critical level fairly quickly, I mentally prepared myself to die as I didn't have any **Healing Crystals** left to counteract the damage. And knowing that I had my blades just outside of the safe range didn't help, either. I closed my eyes.

Faintly, I made out a voice next to my head: "Heal!" I noticed my HP bar going up until 75% before resuming to decline rapidly.

Sighing in relief that I scraped death by a hair's width once more, I made a mental note to reaaaally re-think my strategies on clearing this game. I already almost died twice and I'll be damned if I let it happen a third time. Opening up my eyes, I was greeted by my girlfriend's worried cerulean orbs. Tears shone in her eyes, ready to shed as she wrapped her arms around my body

Looking at my health, I noted that I had 25% of my maximum HP left, despite the healing from Marie. Popping two of my **Greater Health Potions** , I restored my health completely. Standing up on wobbly legs, Marie supported me until I gained my bearings. After that, I stored the **Chronokeeper** back into my inventory; it had done its fair share in this battle.

Muttering a quick "thanks" to Marie and giving her a peck on the cheek, I picked my **Frostbite** up and positioned myself to charge in, in a nimble, ready for combat fencing stance with my left (dominant) hand in front and my right placed on my hip. "Some big-ass boss has a death wish here," I mumbled quietly, flinching when the resting/potting portion of the raid party looked at me as if I was some kind of psychotic mass murderer or something.

Marie told me later that if I were to look at myself at the time, I would've noticed that my eyes were colored a creepy dark green shade.

Normally, I wouldn't do such a thing as attempting to one-woman army an entire floor boss, but in light of him having hurt my little sister, every last bit of restraint and common sense faded into an eerily cold calmness. There and then, I felt nothing but the desire to kick that giant's fat butt.

I gave into the desire.

 **A/N: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Feel free to leave a review if you have thoughts / comments / constructive criticism you'd like to share. I'd appreciate it. Also, I usually reply to reviews via PM, just putting that out there.**

 **Oh well. I guess I'll see you in a few weeks or so.**

 **Ja ne!**

 **~Irelia Yuuki.**


	9. Interim - Sister's reconciliation

**A/N: Well. I'm sorry for the delay, but writer's block, exams, studying, being sick and family drama have rendered me quite unable to write for the last few weeks.**

 **I hope you enjoy this installment of SAO: The Spirit Blades,**

 **~Irelia Yuuki**

 _Muttering a quick "thanks" to Marie and giving her a peck on the cheek, I picked my_ ** _Frostbite_** _up and positioned myself to charge in, in a nimble, ready for combat fencing stance with my left (dominant) hand in front and my right placed on my hip. "Some big-ass boss has a death wish here," I mumbled quietly, flinching when the resting/potting portion of the raid party looked at me as if I was some kind of psychotic mass murderer or something._

 _Marie told me later that if I were to look at myself at the time, I would've noticed that my eyes were colored a creepy dark green shade._

 _Normally, I wouldn't do such a thing as attempting to one-woman army an entire floor boss, but in light of him having hurt my little sister, every last bit of restraint and common sense faded into an eerily cold calmness. There and then, I felt nothing but the desire to kick that giant's fat butt._

 _I gave into the desire._

After the current active party, consisting of tanks to let us damage dealers heal up, fell back, I sprinted towards the boss in a fashion that borderlines reckless, leaving the rest of my group behind. In my mind, a strategy formulated to fight the boss. ' _My_ _ **Frostbite**_ _has the_ _ **Icy**_ _passive, reducing his AGI more the more I hit him. He has 60% of his last HP-bar left, and his rage mode triggers after every HP-bar emptied, so he is unable to rage again. Once his AGI is low enough, I can reliably try to break his hammer and dodge his blows. And if I succeed in breaking the weapon, I assume his AoE stuns' effectivity will fall off. And once that happens, he's done for._ '

Seeing that the boss was in the animation of a stun attack, I quickly sidestepped the AoE and, using the **Shooting Star** sword skill, charged the boss. After the blade connected, I chained a **Star Splash** , a **Neutron** and a **Diagonal Hexagon** to further emphasis the damage output.

Whilst I executed my skills, I noticed that the boss' movements were getting minimally slower, despite him being in rage mode. He had roughly 45% of his last HP-bar remaining.

I noticed that he was swinging his hammer in my direction and jumped to the side, the blow missing me by merely a few centimeters. After the missed blow, the boss started charging up his largest AoE stun, just to be interrupted by Sinon, who had put a clean arrow directly into his weakpoint.

Seeing that opportunity, I used a **Quadruple Pain** , chaining a **Crucifixion** and a **Meteor** to deal the maximum amount of damage to the boss. The **Meteor** did a very beefy amount, roughly 10% of the HP-bar, to the boss whilst the other two skills combined did half of that.

The Boss' movements were getting slower and slower as my skills did more and more damage to him, the **Icy** effect of my **Frostbite** really showing its strengths. And since the boss had slowed down by quite a bit after my last combo, the rest of the raid party took the opportunity and engaged the boss themselves.

With its movement speed impaired, the boss once more let out a threatening roar whilst being pelted by all kinds of sword skills. In reality, though, we all knew that the roar was more of a scare than anything.

Eventually, after me having repeated the 4-skill combo that cleared 15% of the HP bar earlier, the boss exploded into polygons and the complimentary 'CONGRATULATIONS' message popped up. Sighing, I simply checked the pop-up window for my spoils. The last hit bonus was an odd item called **Unmarked Pouch** that had a thumbnail of a question-mark in the menu, which was all it contained apart from a decent amount of col.

Suddenly, I felt tired all over and before I knew it, everything went black.

I opened my eyes to see Marie's concerned face over me, tears unshed in her eyes. "You baka! I was so worried!" She said, crushing me in a tight hug.

After I kind of regained my bearings, I returned the embrace, muttering quiet apologies into her ear as she once more bawled her eyes out. It was only after a while of her crying that I noticed that tears were running down my face too.

After our weeping had ended, I noticed the entirety of the raid party standing around us, their expressions ranging from concern to shock. It was then that Marie loosened her arms around me and we stood up.

An awkward silence enveloped us as everybody tried to find the appropriate words to say in lieu of me fainting, until Diavel spoke up: "Irelia. It's good to see that you're still under the living. I'm glad."

' _Well. At least someone who knows how to break the ice._ ' Was the thing I thought before my girlfriend tugged on my arm, expressing her desire to go home. I wasted no time in voicing that thought out loud: "Thanks for your concern, Diavel, but I think I should be leaving for home now. I suspect that Sakura would like that, too."

Diavel only nodded, seemingly in thought as I got out a **Teleport Crystal** and whispered: "Teleport. **Coral**."

A blue light engulfed us and, seconds later, we appeared in **Coral**. I then noticed that I haven't even taken notice of Asuna after I've woken up. A flash of chestnut in my blurry memory at least confirmed that she had to be alive.

~Time skip: 2 hours. (22nd of February, 2023)

After Marie and I arrived home, I made ramen for both of us and we had a serious conversation about me almost dying. Marie was very, _very_ upset, probably the most upset I had seen her until then.

~Flashback

 _Marie and I had just settled down on the couch, the bowls of ramen in our laps as she spoke up again. "You know, when that boss hit you, I was really worried that you'd disappear from my life for good."_

 _I only nodded, not sure how to respond as I was the cause of the heartache Marie found herself in. Eventually, I gathered my courage and apologized once more. "I'm sorry, 'Ree. I'm really sorry."_

 _After that, Marie started sobbing and replied: "I know you are. But as you probably know, I couldn't live without you. I'd probably jump off Aincrad if you died."_

 _I simply nodded as she continued: "Neh, Maho… why do you keep being so reckless? I can't help but think that you're dancing with death every time you pull something like this off. And to be honest, there is a real chance you might die every time you do those stunts."_

 _After that, we ate in silence as I was pondering the gravity of those words. It was true. With every reckless act, I was putting my life at stake in order to help someone, that someone most commonly being my little sister. But it was also true that I'd do it for Marie too._

" _Marie. You know as well as I do that I do this for Asuna. I'm sorry, but to be honest, if it meant to save my sister's life, I'd do all of those things all over again. I know that this hurts your feelings. And to be honest, I'd do the same things for you, if it came down to it, too. It's just the fact that I love the both of you and I can't bear to see either of you die." I broke the silence and started talking, trying to soothe her._

 _Marie nodded and I continued: "I can only promise you that I'll be more careful, since you know as well as I do that I might do something like that again."_

 _After that, a smile graced Marie's lips once more. "And that's all I can ask for." She said, putting her finished bowl of noodles down on the coffee table and looking at me. "You know, I almost sound like an overly concerned housewife." She said, causing the both of us to giggle. After the giggles subsided, I added: "And I thought I'd be the fun, easily excited gamer girl slash housewife that appears in every nerd's fantasy."_

 _Marie snorted and said: "Oh please. We both know that you'd want to have a job and get high up in the business ladder of some big-shot game company, making one hell of a fortune off that sweet AI thesis you were working on. And then, you'd get yourself a family, children and a big mansion and live out your happily ever-after."_

 _At that, I blushed. I don't know if Marie knew yet, but I was having more and more trouble imagining my future with anyone else but her. 'I wish I could marry her.' I thought, immediately wondering where that thought came from._

 _Pondering for a bit more, I felt like I could actually marry her since same-sex marriage was recognized in SAO. And before I could stop myself, I heard myself saying my thoughts out loud. "Well. Why don't we marry?"_

 _And then I noticed Marie's eyes widen like saucers, almost like the time when I confessed to her at the airport. Fearing the worst, I immediately added: "Sorry! I just blurted it out and didn't mean it like that!"_

 _I turned my head away, not noticing the subsiding shock in Marie's features. Only after having a hand of hers turn my head in her direction did I meet her gaze. She asked: "Did you just propose to me?"_

 _I decided to simply give her the truth, since there was really no room to be mistaken. She heard all of it and our relationship would probably end anyways. "Yea. I did. I was just wondering about your depiction of my future and, before I knew it, blurted it out. I mean, we'r-"_

 _My rant was roughly cut off by Marie's lips on mine and her arms wrapping themselves around my back as she started to kiss me with a passion. Being the good girlfriend I was, I kissed her back. All my thoughts and insecurities were then shoved into the background as the kiss progressed, until we had to separate for air._

" _Yes." She said, making me wonder what it was about._

"… _what?"_

" _Yes. I'll marry you. Even if you proposed to me like a complete idiot would. I love you and will gladly be your wife." After that statement of Marie's, I was completely shocked. My girlfriend had accepted my (accidental) proposal. We're getting married._

 _After the realization hit me, as in_ really _hit me, I let out something that sounded eerily similar to a squeal and enveloped her into a hug. "I love you." I said as she returned the hug._

~Flashback end

And now, I was sitting on the couch, Marie cuddled into my side in the most endearing fashion. My in-game fiancée then looked at me and asked: "Neh, Maho, when do you want to get married?"

I chuckled and gave it a thought. To be frank, there was only one place where we technically could get married right now and that place is on the 1st floor, near the **Black Iron Palace**. I bet that there were more chapels than that tiny one on the 1st floor, though. And it was then that I noticed something being amiss. The engagement ring. It was missing.

"I don't know. Preferably sometime after I've bought you a ring but I honestly wouldn't mind marrying right now if that was what you wanted." I replied, earning myself a kiss from Maire.

"As long as you're happy, I'm happy." She said, causing me to smile. I was certainly happy, I told her, causing her to kiss me. "Let's just cuddle for a while and call it a day." I suggested after we parted, noticing immediately how her arms around me tightened their hold.

~Time skip: -1 hour, Shino's and Kazuto's PoV:

Shino and Kazuto have rented a two-bedroom hotel flat on the 22nd floor for the week. As of now, they were discussing the events that transpired whilst sitting in the living room of said flat.

"Well. It seems like Maho has forgiven Asuna for her little stunt." Shino mused, deep in thought whilst sitting on the couch of Kazuto's room.

Popping himself onto the couch, Kazuto voiced his own thoughts on the events. "That might be. But I think Asuna is in quite a situation right now. Her sister literally put her life on the line back there. I just hope that they rekindle their bond now."

Shino gave a wondering look, an idea having just popped into her head. She wasted no time in voicing that thought: "Neh, how about we invite Asuna for dinner tomorrow? I want to see how she's feeling right now."

After giving Shino's idea a brief thought, Kazuto quickly agreed. It would do good to give Asuna a little push now and then, along with a great share of advice to go with it.

And with that, they sent an invite to Asuna, made dinner and eventually headed to bed.

~The next day (23rd of February, 2023), Asuna's PoV:

That day, Asuna woke up drenched in sweat, having had another nightmare. After noticing that it was just a dream, she stood up and prepared for the day, for she had been invited to dinner by Shino.

Since she had the argument with her big sister, Asuna went through the daily motions like a robot, not really caring that much about anything until Kazuto and Shino invited her for that Christmas get-together dinner. And after that, after getting reaffirmed that the bond with Maho was truly most likely a lost cause, nothing changed. Or if anything changed, it was the fact that she cared even less about any and everything.

And yesterday, she got shaken out of the depressive state by an event that almost took her sister's life. It had only taken another save by Maho to make Asuna realize that she had to apologize. It was most definitely her fault for getting upset at Maho after all.

Now, after having gotten lunch and done her share of grinding for the day, she was sitting in her inn room, lost in thought.

She was thinking of the things Maho told her about her stay in the states and, eventually, came to the conclusion that almost everything her sister told her had some kind of connection with Marie. For example that one time when she went to the amusement park with a 'friend' of hers. Or that one time when she had a traditional tea party, where that 'friend' was also present. All the happy times Maho was talking about somehow had this certain friend tied to them.

In the end, she had to accept the fact that Maho, in fact, was homosexual and had found a partner, no matter how she, or as she'd later put it, her parents saw it. That included accepting Marie as Maho's girlfriend, too.

After a brief reflection upon her beliefs, she noticed that almost everything she thought about the society was heavily prejudiced, influenced by her parents. Thus, Asuna decided to develop her own perspective and point of view towards society. No one should be able to tell her that something is wrong without logic or reason, for that would be simple prejudice. Some time away from her parents would do her a world of good when she cleared the game, she deduced.

After that, she noticed that it was almost time to meet up with Kazuto and Shino for dinner. She decided that she should depart now as it wasn't in her liking to be fashionably late. It was unbecoming for a lady of status to be unpunctual, her mother taught her.

~Time skip: 5 minutes, Kazuto's Shino's and Asuna's PoV:

Kazuto was sitting on the couch and Shino was in the kitchen preparing dinner when somebody knocked on the door, prompting Kazuto to stand up and get it. Opening the door and expecting to be met with Asuna on the other side, Kazuto was almost surprised at the scene before him. Asuna was all dressed up in a yellow summer dress that went until her knees, her chestnut hair flowing freely down to her back and modest black ballerinas to finish up the look.

"Good evening, Kazuto-kun." Asuna greeted, causing Kazuto to flash her a smile and open the door further. "Come in. Shino is making ramen."

Asuna stepped into the room and took a seat on the couch, taking a look around the room. "Quite a nice place you've rented here, Kazuto-kun. I could only wish that my hotel room was as spacious as this one." She commented, still appreciating the large size of the room. Kirito took a seat, too, after he saw Asuna sitting down.

"Well, you might not want to have such a flat rented anymore once you hear how pricy this thing was to rent for an entire week." Shino commented coming from the kitchen, two bowls of Ramen in hand. Setting said bowls of Ramen down on the dinner table, she went back to the kitchen and grabbed the third bowl.

"Dinner's ready!" She called, causing Asuna and Kazuto to stand up and make their ways to the dinner table. Shino herself sat there already after having set the table and having served the noodles.

After a chorus of 'Itadakimasu!' the three players started to enjoy the ramen in relative silence, not wanting a repeat experience of the noodles turning stale on the one end and being deep in thought on the other. In the end, no one really noticed nor minded the lack of conversation.

After everyone was finished with their respective meal, Kazuto decided that it was time to start the real conversation. Surprisingly, Asuna beat him to it. "You're probably wanting to give me advice about apologizing to Onee-chan, don't you, Kazuto-kun, Shino-chan?" She asked, startling them both as they only gave off a pair of small nods.

After getting over the shock of Asuna finding out about their hidden intentions, Kazuto spoke up: "Well, Asuna. I think that you really start considering apologizing to her. In my opinion, this entire thing has been going on for too long already. Maho thinks probably that you still needs your space despite having already forgiven you, which is probably the reason for her not having contacted you."

"She has probably already forgiven you when we had the Christmas party, Asuna. Your Onee-chan isn't as unforgiving as her demeanor often implies. She forgives quickly, but remembers the hurt for quite a bit. That is the part of her that you can often see as cold and unemotional. She hides her emotions to hide the hurt she's gone through." Shino added, giving Asuna her own opinion on why Maho was so cold sometimes.

"In this case, I think it should be me who apologizes to her…" Asuna pondered, factoring in Shino's and Kazuto's opinions on the situation. "It was my fault for snapping after all. And even after that, she's ready to throw her life away if it meant saving mine. I'm feeling like a spoiled little brat right now, having taken everything for granted until I lost it."

Kazuto chuckled at that. "To be honest, you were kind of behaving like one the other day. Maho was looking out for you but you snapped at her and accused her of something she had no influence on and was completely incorrect to boot. I don't want to sound condescending but this is simply wrong." He stated, apparently still pondering about something.

"Anyways, just apologize to her." Shino said, having had enough insight on Asuna's thinking and just wanting to make sure that Asuna got the point; she should apologize.

"I will." Asuna reaffirmed, standing up from her seat at the dinner table and moving to the couch, prompting the other two to do the same. "I'll go meet her and Marie for lunch sometime soon. There's still something I've got to tell them both." She smiled as she envisioned the scene in her mind.

"Just be honest with her, Asuna. Maho is one of the best kinds of big sister I could imagine and I'd hate to see your bond staying like this." Kazuto added, sincerity in his voice.

"Thanks for the advice, Kazuto-kun. I'll be sure to keep it in mind." With that, Asuna thought, the serious conversation would be over, and it was over indeed. After that, they reminisced about the good times they shared with Maho before all this started. The good, the bad and the crazy times they had so fondly added into their memories all unfolded in little anecdotes and short stories.

After that, Asuna left for her own hotel room and, eventually, headed to bed.

Somewhere else on the 22nd floor of Aincrad, a grey-haired girl sat on a chair in a hotel room, pondering about all that has happened in the last three months. She was still upset about a few things that have happened without her knowledge, getting trapped in this game being one of them.

She thought about many things, some of which included her family. ' _Nanairo-chan, when I clear this game, I'll find you. I swear._ '

In the end, there was nothing she could do for now, though. Grinding was an option, but this late in the night no one wanted to party up and solo-grinding was dangerous. The mobs were harder and the XP-gain was sub-par.

Her thoughts went back to the last boss fight, where that alpha tester almost died trying to protect someone. 'She's brave. Probably braver than I could've ever been. She isn't afraid of protecting someone important to her even if her life was on the line.' Oddly enough, the scene is kind of similar to what she experienced with her sister. In retrospect, she thinks that she should've fought more for the sake of them being together.

With that in mind, she decided to approach that girl and ask her for some advice. Hopefully, there will be an opportunity to talk with her at boss fight meetings or some kind of coincidental meeting between herself and said girl or her girlfriend.

She then went to sleep, hoping her dreams would grant her a sanctuary from these troubled thoughts.

They didn't.

 **A/N: WHAAAT?! We wait almost 8 weeks for this chapter and all we get are measly 4000 words?! AND NO PLOT TO BOOT?**

 **Once again, I sincerely apologize for this but life's a b*tch.**

 **I hope that I'll be updating sooner next time but in all honesty, I doubt it.**

 **Anywho, thank you for everyone who's sitting this one through and waiting patiently for this story to get updated. I can't tell you how grateful i am about this.**

 **If you enjoyed, please leave a review, it's a lot of motivation for me.**

 **See you soon,**

 **~Irelia Yuuki.**


	10. Glossary - Skills & residual effects

_One-Handed Curved Sword_ _:_

 **Reaver** : A basic dash-type sword skill

 _One-Handed Sword_ _:_

 **Slant** : A simple sword skill slashing diagonally.

 **Vertical** : A simple sword skill slashing vertically.

 **Horizontal** : A simple sword skill slashing horizontally.

 **Rage Spike** : A dash-type skill that follows into an upwards strike at the target.

 **Vertical Arc** : A simple sword skill creating a 'V' shape trajectory.

 **Sharp Nail** : A Sword Skill that consists of an upward right to left diagonal slash, followed by a left to right horizontal slash, ending with a downward right to left diagonal slash. An alternative execution of the skills consists of three vertical slashes.

 _One-Handed Rapier_ _:_

 **Linear** : A lightning-fast thrust at the enemy.

 **Quadruple Pain** : A mid-level rapid four-hit thrust that can immobilize the target.

 **Shooting Star** : A charge-dash type sword skill that does great damage on impact.

 **Diagonal Hexagon** : a mid-level rapier sword skill consisting of three diagonal crossing slashes, forming a hexagon, and a stab at the crossing point of the slashes, stunning the enemy.

 **Neutron** : A high-ranking extreme speed Sword Skill that delivers 5 consecutive thrusts.

 **Star Splash** : A high level, high speed 8-hit thrusting sword skill. If one connects the thrusts, one gets an eight pointed star.

 **Meteor** : A high level, high damage 1-hit sword skill that is only usable after another sword skill has been used. The damage scales with the amount of hits the user has delivered in the last 5 seconds, every 10 hits doubling the damage.

 _Katana:_

 **Ukifune** : A mid-level sword skill that knocks the enemy back, dealing moderate damage to him.

 **Tsumujiguruma** : An omnidirectional, massive damage sword skill that hits after leaping in the air and channeling for a few seconds.

 _Spirit Blades: Hiten_ _:_

 **Twisting Clouds** : The blades rotate around the orb on a defined orientation for 3 seconds, increasing radius and damage every second. Triggered passives: **Attack Boost** , **Brute Strength**.

 **Lightning Revolver** : The blades rotate around the orb, pointing in the same direction, gaining stacks in the channeling process (1 stack/rotation; 12.5 seconds/rotation; max 24 stacks). On release: the blades hover in place, rotating in the opposite direction. The top blade stabbing the target in a lightning fast manner. When the striking blade retracts, all blades rotate 90 degrees, repeating the striking process. (1 stack = 1 strike) The channel will be aborted if the player gets damaged or disabled, losing all stacks in the process. Also, the user generates **Hate** of the bosses whilst channeling. Triggered passives: **True Damage,** **Attack Boost,** **Pointed.**

 **Heaven's Gates:** blades form a spearhead and dash in the designated direction until reaching max range (15m) or hitting the first target. During the duration of this ability, the **Spirit Bonds** passives debuff is halved. Upon hitting a target, the blades spread open, slashing the enemy apart and applying **Bleed** and teleporting themselves back to the user afterwards. Triggered passives: **Attack Boost, Pointed, True Damage, Durability shred, Brute strength.**

 **Divine Judgement** : the user dashes towards the enemy, dealing damage on-impact whilst the blades slash the enemy apart in an array of quick stabs, jabs and slashes. Amplifies the damage dealt to the target by the user by 150% during the duration of this skill (4.5s). This does not apply to this skill itself. The user cannot use other skills on the **Chronokeeper** until this skill has been over for at least 1 second. Stuns the enemy for 0.5 seconds after the skill ends. Triggered passives: **Attack Boost, Crit Up, Pointed.**

 **Transcendent Blades** : summons a ghost copy of the **Chronokeeper** , orbiting the user, who can then throw out the blades at will. These do not trigger the **Spirit Bonds** passive and disappear once having reached maximum range (20m). Also, ignores unit collision, dealing damage to every enemy it passes through. Heals the user for 10% of the damage dealt. Triggered passives: **Attack Boost, Brute Strength, Crit up,** **Durability shred.**

 _Passive effects of weapons, armor, etc._

 **(C) = COMMON**

 **(U) = UNCOMMON**

 **(R) = RARE**

 **(S) = SUPER RARE**

 **(L) = LEGENDARY/UNIQUE**

 _Weapons:_

 **(C) Attack Boost** : pretty much self-explanatory.

 **(U) Brute Strength** : does 25-50% (depending on upgrade level) of the damage regardless if the target is blocking or not (counts as piercing damage).

 **(L) Equipment Break** : does one third of the opponent's equipment's max durability as durability damage to the hit equipment if the equipment is of lower quality than the weapon.

 **(L)** **True Damage** : damage dealt by this weapon ignores all defensive values of the target (can still be blocked, reduces 25% of the damage dealt).

 **(U) Block Boost** : also pretty much self-explanatory.

 **(R) Durability shred** : does a flat amount of durability damage on hit (depending on weapon type and rarity).

 **(R) Reinforced** : 10% increased durability, 5% chance (on-hit) that no durability will be used for the strike

 **(S) Unbreakable** : durability is increased by 1000% (not actually unbreakable)..

 **(U) AGI/STR UP** : also self-explanatory.

 **(L) Ethereal Shift** : weapon can shift through one solid object once every 60 seconds.

 **(S) Two Handed** : sword can execute 2-handed sword skills, enlarging the sword whilst doing so (only one-handed swords).

 **(R) Scavenger** : increases the drop-rate of rare item drops by 5-50% (depending on upgrade level). Also affects all boss's **Last-Attack Bonuses** , increasing their quality.

 **(U) Greed** : increases the amount of Col dropped by 100%, decreases the drop-rate of rare items by 50%.

 **(C) Fast Charge** : halves the charge time for charge-type skills.

 **(C) Quick Rest** : decreases the freeze period after a sword skill by 5-50% (depending on upgrade level).

 **(U) Crit up** : increases the critical strike chance by 5-50% (depending on upgrade level) of the weapon's base stats.

 **(U) Modifiable** : one is able to attach small items to the fuller, hand guard and hilt of the sword, not affecting stats.

 **(C) Pointed** : does 20-30% extra stabbing damage.

 **(L) Blood Well** : stores 50% of the dealt damage as BP (1HP = 1BP; max BP = max HP), decaying after 3 minutes when not dealing damage. When the HP gets below 20%: Consumes all BP to heal you for 50% of the consumed points.

 **(S) Icy** : your attacks lower the opponent's equipment's temperature by a flat amount (depending on weapon type and rarity), eventually freezing his equipment over. The frozen equipment will have its AGI lowered by a flat amount (depending on weapon type and rarity) and 50 times the durability loss than usual. Makes the user immune to **Fiery**.

 **(L) Aura: Frost** : Cold surrounds the user when the weapon is drawn, lowering the temperature of everything surrounding it over time, eventually freezing it over. The frozen equipment will have its AGI lowered by 50% and 50 times the durability loss than usual. Additionally, makes user immune to **Icy** and **Aura:** **Heat**.

 **(S) Fiery** : your attacks raise the opponent's equipment's temperature by a flat amount (depending on weapon type and rarity). The heated weapon will loose durability much more rapidly but do a flat amount (depending on temperature) more damage. Armor hit by the weapon will weaken and deal a damage over time debuff to the wearer when the temperature raises too high. When the temperature exceeds the weapon's or the armor's limit (depending on rarity and type), it will melt, turning it into the raw material it was crafted from. Makes immune to **Icy**.

 **(L) Aura: Heat** : The user heats up his surroundings when the weapon is drawn, heating the equipment up like in **Fiery**. Makes immune to the aforementioned buff. One CANNOT melt equipment with this aura.

 _Armor:_

 **(R)** **Sturdy** : 2.5% extra DEF.

 **(U) AGI/STR UP** : self-explanatory.

 **(S) Thorns** : returns 2.5-7.5% of the damage dealt to the user to the enemy's weapon as durability damage. (1HP = 1DUR).

 **(L) Blood Bond** : the less HP the user has, the more DEF the armor gets (up to 250% extra DEF at 20% of MAX HP).

 **(S) Unbreakable** : durability is increased by 1000% (not actually unbreakable).

 **(U) Tenacious** : reduces the duration of stuns and other disables by 10-20%.

 **(R) Fervor** : hitting an enemy with an attack grants 15% AGI, rapidly decaying over 2 seconds.

 **(U) Thick insulation** : if the armor was pierced by a stab type weapon, the user takes 20% less damage.

 **(R) Bulwark** : When the user is blocking, he takes 70% reduced piercing damage (does not apply to true damage).

 **(C) Lightweight** : increases the wearer's current AGI by 1-10% (depending on upgrade level) (doesn't stack with other %-increases).

 **(R) Reinforced plating** : reduces all incoming damage by 2.5-10%, decreases AGI by 2.5% (depending on upgrade level) (does not apply to true damage).


End file.
